Shadow: Deep dark secrets await!

Wang: They do?

Shadow: They do.

Wang: Oh, they do. We don't own a thing!

Chapter 15: Truth

They came out of the water close to where the Zora had died. They had swum underwater the whole way, thanks to the underwater breathing capabilities of Nadai's new suit and the Zora body Link had. They walked up to the shore and sat down just beyond the waves. It was all dark around them, save for the stars that shown between clouds far above them.

Link reached up and removed the mask from his face, and his body instantly grew smaller as he returned to being a Hylian. He wiped the water from his face, and set the mask on the ground.

"There was a Zora here earlier today, I played the Song of Healing and he became a mask."

"I watched as the Gerudo's killed him."

"His wife had laid eggs. She lost her voice and can't sing for this band she's in."

"I rescued half the eggs from the fortress. The rest are lost at sea."

"I still don't know where the temple is."

"Neither do I."

They were silent for a long time. Neither one looked at each other. Both of them stared out over the water, watching the waves leap up and meet the sky time and time again. Tatl sat on Nadai's shoulder, not saying anything either. It was if no one wanted to break the silence.

"When I told you I couldn't tell you that was because I had made a promise."

"To whom?"

"The three Goddesses."

"…what?"

"I was told that if I told anyone that the world would be destroyed, astronomical consequences and all that good stuff."

"We've dealt with that all before."

"This came from the Goddesses themselves, so I'm not sure if we could." He paused. "But let all of that be damned. We're the Heroes of Time, and you are the only one who doesn't know. You deserve to know."

"Know what?"

"When we first met, back on that bridge before Kokiri Forest, I beat you in combat."

"What about it?"

"You knocked me out. And if I remember, I couldn't even come close to beating you in combat until I was an adult, and even then I couldn't win against you until I had received training from Shiek and Wanderer."

"And?"

"What if I told you that I had lost all of my memories before that point?"

"Link, what are you talking about?"

"I had done everything before. And I had died."

Silence. Nothing exploded and the moon didn't come down to kill them. Nothing bad like he had expected had happened.

"What? What are you saying?"

He took her hand without thinking. "Navi woke me up months and months ago, and the Great Deku Tree called me. I went to him, and was told that this Gerudo named Ganondorf was trying to cast evil upon him. I failed. I then went to Princess Zelda. Then I failed. It took me so long, so much longer than you would ever expect, to get the other three Spiritual Stones. Then I became an adult. Then I failed. To compensate for the change of body and mental state, I lost myself. I held out for a long time, a very long time. And I failed.

"It wasn't until the Water Temple when I truly lost myself. When I came out of that place, I was a monster in all but body. I killed. I slaughtered. I stormed Ganondorf's castle and killed his whole army single handedly. Then I faced Ganondorf. Then I faced Gannon. Gannondorf caught me by surprise and I died."

"…Link?"

"The sages saved me then. They sacrificed themselves and all their power to bring me to the Sacred Realm. That was when the Goddesses gave me a choice. Go back in time and do everything all over again, or face Gannondorf as he was now, wounded and pained, just like I was. I chose to go back. There was some small part of me that wanted to fix everything that I had messed up before. So Navi and I went back in time. I was given a second chance."

"…She was there too?"

"She woke me up, and I knew everything. But I wasn't allowed to speak of it. I met you. Beat you. Then I lost all my memories." He looked at her. "You weren't there before, when I was a monster. And then you were here. And we did it. We saved Hyrule."

"…I…I wasn't there?"

"If you were, it wasn't like I remember now." Link's eyes moistened and tears began to fall. "I didn't get my memories all at once. It was little things at first, like in the Forest Temple. It wasn't until the end of the fight, when we were against Gannondorf, when my memories came back to me. That was why my head was always hurting. My memories were coming back bit by bit, and more importantly, when they came back I realized a singular truth."

"Navi always knew, didn't she? That's why you need to see her."

"It would explain why she knew so much about Hyrule back then. It would explain why she stayed around for so long. She was special. And when I needed to talk to her the most I couldn't."

"And what about me?"

"What about you?"

"I'm just, what, a figment of some imagination? I'm a messed up creation? A mistake? I shouldn't have been here?"

"No!" He shouted out, gripping her hand tightly.

"Don't you see, it wasn't Malon or Ruto or Zelda or Navi who saved me. It was you. It was you whom made me stay sane. You helped bring me out of my despair in the Water Temple. It took the world to break me apart just for me to see that the answer to my salvation was beside me all along."

"Then why didn't you tell me earlier?"

"'Cause I'm a moron?" He hung his head. "I have no excuse. If you still want to leave, go ahead. I don't deserve you."

"Maybe you don't."

He waited for her to leave, but she didn't leave.

"Was that all that was bothering you?" She asked softly.

"That's it. That's why I couldn't tell you anything."

"Not that." She tilted his head towards hers, looking him in the eyes. "This." She kissed him gently.

They pulled away. "Uh, what?"

"I think our time as adults messed with our heads."

"You think?"

"I think we still carry ourselves like we're seventeen again, going to save the world."

"We've always been going to save the world."

"But we carry ourselves like adults. Like the Heroes of Time, only a little younger. I want kids."

He blinked. "What?"

"I want kids." She leaned into him, holding his hand. She stared out over the water. "I want to have our own children."

"But…we're…kids."

"Are we? Certainly we're kids in body, but not in mind. We'll get called out, but I think it's alright. I want you."

"…I want you too."

"But we can't."

"We can't."

"We're kids."

"I'm not sure I'm even to physically able to do it right now anyways."

"So I have a suggestion."

"What?"

"We take things slow, when we're done here. And try to be something older than ourselves, but younger than what we should be."

"…I don't get it."

"Neither do I, really. But I'm willing to try."

"After all of this is done."

"After all if this is done."

They were silent, holding each other's hand and staring out over the water. A sense of peace came over them. For the first time for Link and Nadai, it was like things were finally coming around.

"So I have a question." All eyes turned to the fairy. "Who's Navi?"

Link was silent. Nadai shot him a glance, and nudged him. "What?"

"She deserves to know."

"Does she?"

"She does."

He grimaced. "But—"

"No. The truth."

Link sighed, the pent up frustration inside of him threatening to boil over. Then he breathed in and out and let the frustration go. It was time to start anew.

"Where I come from, in Hyrule, as a Kokiri you are given a fairy companion. There are two kinds of fairies in Hyrule, I'm not sure about here. There are the white fairies, like Navi, whom are fairy companions to Kokiri. Then there are red fairies, these ones don't have a master. When a Kokiri dies, their fairy dies with them. Navi was an exception. But she was also my fairy."

"What do you mean, "an exception?""

"Her own Kokiri died a long time before I met Navi for the first time. She survived."

"How do you know that her Kokiri died? What if that Kokiri is still alive?"

Link's eyes went flat. "That's impossible."

"Is it?" Tatl asked. "I've been seeing a lot of that in this past week or so."

Link was silent.

"But that might not be the case, right?" Nadai asked. "If Navi's Kokiri was still alive, wouldn't we have seen her before?"

"Right." Link said, his confidence grew a little. "Navi is alive, that I know, regardless of where she is."

They were all silent for a moment. "Is that why you don't trust me?" Tatl asked.

"…Maybe it's not don't, but rather can't."

"Was it because you loved her?"

"Yes."

"I'm not replacing Navi."

"I know that."

"…I understand how you feel."

"No you don't."

"I do."

"You don't."

"Tael and myself left the Great Fairy and ran away. When we tried to go back, she had others she loved instead of us."

Link and Nadai exchanged a quick glance. So this was what was going on with her back then.

"I know that she didn't replace us. I know I still have a place in her heart that is all for me to own. But it doesn't feel like that. So Tael and myself in a fit of, what, jealousy? Yeah, jealousy. In a fit of jealousy we ran off without revealing ourselves to the Great Fairy and we found Skull Kid."

"You found for yourself a new home." Nadai said softly.

"Yes. I'm not saying Navi did the same. But it might be a lot more complicated than her just disappearing."

"I know that!"

"Maybe she was forced to leave, or maybe she was taken. From what it sounds like, she loved you guys too. People like that don't leave for a reason."

"Then why did you leave the Great Fairy?"

"…I was young. And foolish. And, I don't know, adventurous? I was ready for more than just sitting around doing nothing all day. But now? What I wouldn't give to do nothing once more."

"Isn't that why we're here?" Nadai said softly. "To make it that we can do that kind of stuff?"

Link leaned over to the mask. "That's right." He put on the mask, his body growing taller and sleeker. "We have a job to do."

In the darkness that covers the sky before predawn, a small shape could be seen over the horizon. It was vaguely boat shaped, and it had come from the north.

"It's the Gerudos."

"Think they're searching for us?" Link asked.

"I think they're after the other eggs." Nadai got up, slowly stretching out tired muscles. "Once they figured out we stole the eggs and killed their boss they would be worried we would be after the other eggs. We should follow them."

"Wait, you killed their boss?"

"Yeah." Her tone was flat, and low.

"Well, one less person to take care of, I guess."

"I didn't want to kill her."

"…I know."

"But she wasn't, well, a person in the conventional sense. She seemed so much eviler than any of Gerudos I knew when I was younger."

"You don't have to rationalize it to me."

"I know."

"Remember, I used to be monstrous too."

Link went off into the water, leaving the two of them behind. "Link won't say it, but he's thankful for you."

"How so?"

"You didn't want to take us to the Great Fairy, but you did anyways."

"…I was that obvious?"

"Just a little." Nadai smiled. "Things won't change right off. He's a little too stubborn for that. But, he is thankful and he will listen to you."

"How do you know?"

"I've been by his side for so long, I know him almost as well as myself. Now let's get going, we have to go save the world."

"We're just saving some eggs."

"To that Zora, those eggs are her world."

They went into the water, and swam off after Link and the boat. The boat went out, further and further south and deeper than they had expected. Tatl was nervous, and held onto Nadai tightly.

"Something's wrong?"

"The water isn't right. It's like…there's something poisoning the water."

"Poison? Like in the swamp?"

"Something worse than that. It's more subtle. I think that if you weren't in your suit or if Link wasn't a Zora you'd be dead by now."

"And yourself?"

"I have a protective bubble around myself." Tatl smiled. "I should be good."

Link dropped back to them. His Zora body allowed him to be much faster than Nadai, whom would normally beat him in any sort of water-related race.

"They stopped, and are dropping anchor."

True enough, a hundred yards from them the boat had coasted to a stop. A large anchor had fallen and it sank lower and lower into the water. It was hard to tell where it ended, for the bottom of the ocean floor was out of sight.

"You want to fight them first?" Link asked.

"I'd rather not." Nadai answered. "I don't want to be like…"

The flashes of the brief fight with the Boss flashed through her mind. She didn't want to be like that again, full of rage and hatred. Was that what Link had to deal with in his previous life? If so, just how different had he been, doing that kind of thing over and over and over and over again? The thought was enough to bring a chill to her bones that had nothing to do with the cold water they were in. Maybe it might be better for her to not be in combat. Rather that than be a monster again.

"I understand. I'll distract them." Link turned his back to her. "You want to get the eggs then? Tatl can help you."

Nadai smirked, glad that he understood and didn't mention it. "Since when did you call the shots?"

He shrugged. "Dunno. It just, feels right? I guess."

"Well, go and feel right over there," she smiled. "I've got the eggs." She went down, following the anchor's chain to the bottom of the sea. She could feel the pressure beginning to build up against her suit. "Does this suit handle all of this pressure?"

"It should. I mean, the other Gerudos managed to get down this deep, so you should be able to do so to." Tatl answered. "But I would hurry up anyways."

Nadai nodded. "That sounds good to me."

She went down to the floor, floating a few feet above the sandy, rocky floor. Large holes were spread about, and Tatl shivered.

"Those are Deep Python nesting caves."

"Deep Pythons?"

"Large underwater snakes." Tatl clarified. "I heard some Terminians talking about them a while ago, saying that they were just fantasy. One of them claimed to have seen them though."

"Let me guess, it's nesting season for them then."

"It wouldn't surprise me if it was the case."

"Anything else to know about these snakes?"

"They like to eat Zoras and their eggs?" Tatl shrugged. "Not a lot is known about them, but The Great Fairy mentioned that the Zoras and the Deep Pythons were mortal enemies back in the day."

"Sounds like the Gorons and the Dodongos."

"The Gorons and the dodo-whatsits?"

"Dodongos. Lizard creatures that breathe fire." Nadai said. "So if I were a Zora egg, where would I be?"

"My guess is in one of these caves."

Nadai nodded. "Can you shed some more light, it's hard to see down here."

Tatl's protective bubble emitted a light, soft, cream-covered light. It grew brighter. "I can't hold it for long."

"Then let's not waste any time."

Together they went to the first cave. Inside was a large sea serpent, but it's eyes were glassy and empty. Nadai came closer to the beast, holding her hand out and touching the scaly hide.

"Dead."

"The poison?"

"Maybe. The eggs."

"They have a hard shell, maybe they'll be safe."

"We don't know until we have them." Nadai turned around. "See them?"

"Nothing."

"Then we keep on searching, double time."

Up above, Link waited under the boat. No one had gotten out yet of the vessel, and he couldn't tell if anyone was going to come out. He debated going out of the water to face them, but he would have the advantage under the water, even inexperienced as he was in his Zora body.

The first person hit the water with a quiet splash, followed by four more. Five in all, and all of them bore large tridents with serrated tips. Link gulped. Those tips would probable pierce his skin if he was stabbed, and subsequently he would probably be ripped to shreds if those tridents were pulled out of his body.

"Oi!"

The Gerudos turned to him. One of them was familiar, it was the one that had knocked him out earlier. She also looked to be their leader, in some fashion or another.

"It's the fish."

"If I'm a fish then you're chum."

Link readied himself to fight. The long fins along his arms seemed to grow in front of him, but he couldn't tell if they actually grew or if he was imagining things. If he was right, he was starting to get light headed. Something wasn't right. The further he had gone into the water the more lightheaded he felt. Was this some sort of poison? Or was this closer to the damage done when he spilled the secrets of his past?

He couldn't tell.

"Get him."

Gerudos were fast. He had a hard time fighting against them in his previous life, and Nadai had done most of the fighting when they were adults. He really hadn't pitted himself against them as a child. And not even as a Zora. He knew these women were dangerous and skilled, and he wasn't going to pull any stops.

However, he was a Zora right now and could straight up move faster than most anything in the water. He reacted as though he was an adult and unarmed. The first Gerudo flew past him, missing him. He hit the woman in the back of the head, and his fins cut through her suit like paper.

The woman screamed, and he followed through with a kick to propel himself away from her and away from the next woman's attack. He looked at the fins for the first time, really looked at them. They reminded him of Ruto's own fins. They were long and sharp. And if what he had just done was any indication, they were deadly.

He'd have to get used to them before he could properly use them.

The second Gerudo was upon him, and he blocked the trident stab with his fins. The fins held, and the woman was pushed back. If they were above water, they would have been equal strengths, but below water the added friction against the Gerudo caused her strength to be halved. Link didn't have any such resistance against him.

He moved before the woman could respond, and disarmed her. He punched her, the point of his fin piercing her chest. The woman cried out in pain, and swam backwards. He turned to the next two, their boss was behind them fiddling with something. He narrowed his eyes. He should finish this quickly.

The two women worked in tandem, attacking and defending each other with precision only seen in teams which have spent long hours practicing together. It would be nigh impossible to fight against them and win. Already the other two women were recovering themselves and readying themselves for another round. However, Link was something better than that. He had a lifetime of practice and skill to draw upon; a lifetime where he had fought against insurmountable odds and won against them time and time again. He had also trained with Shiek, the last know Shiekah, and Wanderer, a fighter whom had more skill in a single pinky than Link had in his whole body.

It wasn't fair.

Much like Nadai was able to twirl about and strike out against numerous enemies numerous times with her twin daggers, Link was able to do the same thing. Being in the water gave him the speed advantage, and his knowledge meant that he knew how to react against them. Tridents and spears were much the same thing, and he had fought against plenty of spear-using Gerudos in his time.

He spun about, dodging attacks from all sides as his arms whipped back and forth, cutting and piercing the Gerudo women. While he liked using a sword much better than these fins, he couldn't deny that the fins were sharp and dangerous to a T. When he was done spinning about, the four women around him were injured to a point where retreat was far better than sticking around to fight.

But all the women he had cut were moving slower and slower, and their attacks became sloppy. He watched their eyes slowly became glassy and clouded. He understood then that there was something in the water, something that caused them to be like that and what was giving him a terrible light-headedness that didn't help with the spinning he had just done. Some sort of poison was in the water. He needed to finish this fast, find Nadai, and get out of there before he fainting was a better idea than staying awake.

While he was dizzy, a chain wrapped around him. He looked to their leader, whom had a strange device in her hands that had shot the chain at him.

"Struggle and I'll kill you slowly." The woman promised.

"Weren't you going to do that anyways?" He peered closer at the weapon in her hands. "Isn't that a Hookshot?"

"A what?"

"Ah, you don't call it that."

"Quiet, fish!"

"You should really not call me that."

The chain tightened suddenly, and Link looked down to see his blood in the water. Oh. This chain had spikes.

"Now come here!" The woman pulled him close with the reverse function of her hook-shot-whatchamacallit.

Link squirmed, but couldn't resist the pull of the machine. The woman pulled out a saber, and went to decapitate him. He pulled off the mask. The chains around him slackened, and he slipped free. He watched as the woman's eyes went wide in shock. He held his breath, feeling the poison in the water hurting him already.

Using the momentum of being pulled, he swam at her. She switched tactics, and aimed her saber to cut him from above. He put the mask back on. In a sudden instant, he went from moving like a tortoise through the water to moving as fast as he had when he had broken the wall. His arm fin cut her, and her head rolled through the water away from her.

Then Link blacked out, the poison finally getting to him.

He awoke to a gentle rocking motion. He was looking up at the sky, the wounds around his body wrapped up in soft linen. He got up. He was in a boat, presumably the Gerudos, and Nadai was rowing back to shore.

"You're up."

"I am."

"You okay?"

"I was a Hylian for a bit against them, using it to my advantage. I guess the poison was more potent than I thought. At least, I think it was poison."

"It's poison. It killed the monsters down there, and it had almost gotten the eggs. When i got back up to the surface, I found you floating in the water by the dead bodies, I thought you were dead at first."

"Nah, I'm good." He was sore as all get out, but he wasn't out for the count.

He took the oars from Nadai and went about rowing instead of her. She looked at him.

"I got the eggs."

"What monsters had them?"

"Hoarded by this Deep Python."

"Deep Python?"

"Giant sea snake." She answered. "As I said, they died to the poison in the water before they ate any of the eggs."

"So we rescued them all."

"We did."

"That's good."

"I also got this." Nadai pulled the contraption out from behind her.

"Ah, the Not-Hookshot."

"It's got spikes on the chain. That's torturous right there."

"I know, it's what hit me."

"Do we keep it?"

"It might be useful." Link looked over Nadai's shoulder, where the faintest hint of dawn could be seen over the horizon. "Keep it and you use it."

"I'd rather it didn't have spikes."

"Same here. We can work on that as we go."

Nadai began to fiddle with the machine. Several buttons were on it. One was to release, and one was to draw it in, she knew that much. But there was another button that she didn't know its function. Whatever the Gerudos were, it included bloodthirsty and horrible. But they had to be more scientifically advanced than Nabooru and those back in Hyrule. Whatever this was, it was scary.

She'll try it out later.

A few hours of rowing later dawn broke out over the horizon and the sun was low in the sky. They had gone straight east, and in doing so they had come close to where the Zoras had first taken Link. Link brought the boat close to the shore and they disembarked.

The Zoras had to have hid when they saw the boat. After all, it was the Gerudos originally, so it was doubtless that they would recognize and hide from them. But seeing a Zora and a Gerudo getting out of the boat had them intrigued. Intrigued enough for a lone woman to come running out to them and the others to trail behind.

Link recognized the others behind the woman. They were the self-proclaimed band members and friends of this Mikau character. And that meant that the woman was the dead Zora's wife. The Zora woman frowned as she came closer. Her mouth opened to speak, but nothing came out.

"You must be Lulu." Link said.

The woman nodded slowly. Her mouth opened and nothing came out.

"My name is Link." He pointed to Nadai. "She's Nadai. She helped me rescue the eggs."

Nadai unhooked the bag from her belt and handed it to the woman. "They're all in there."

The Zora snatched the bag and looked inside. She held it close to her chest. After a moment she looked up at Link expectantly.

"Mikau is dead."

She nodded slowly, as if she had already known.

"I'm sorry. He…he loved you very much."

Her mouth opened and a raspy sound like wind over sand came out. "I know." She looked up. "Thank you for saving my children."

A chill came down over Link's spine, and he turned at the same time as Nadai to the ocean. Whatever poison had been in that water, it hadn't been natural. Something was wrong with this place, more so than the Gerudo Pirates. It was like the swamp and the mountains, the wrongness was unnatural. Tavi shivered as well. Majora had been here, and he had done something evil to this place.

"What is it?" Someone asked, Link didn't know his name.

"I need to get to the temple." Link said. "That's why we're here." He turned to them. "Can you get to Clocktown? It'll be safer there."

"Safer?"

"Surely you felt the poison in the water." Link narrowed his eyes and looked back over the water. "Something is wrong with this place."

"We can." Lulu's voice came out stronger. "You'll need a ride to the temple. Take the Giant Turtle."

"Giant Turtle?"

A sound came out of Lulu, and a most beautiful sound came out of her lips. Link and Nadai both played instruments, and they both had traveled around to various cultures and listened to their native music. But nothing was as beautiful as Lulu's voice.

Almost out of nowhere a giant turtle came out of the water.

"That's a giant turtle." Nadai looked up at it.

The turtle had to be about the size of the Great Deku Tree, and maybe twice as wide. On its back was a sodden pair of tall palm trees, both of which were old and strong. The turtle looked at the three of them on the shore.

"You wish to travel to the Great Bay Temple?"

"And it talks." Nadai continued. "The turtle talks."

"Is that a yes?" The Giant Turtle continued, ignoring Nadai's comments.

"Yes." Nadai answered.

"Oh good, it's been years since I've been there."

"Go, we'll head to the town." Lulu smiled. "Thank you for my children. Thank you."

Link nodded. "No problem."

They turned to look at the turtle. "How do we get on?" Tatl shrugged.

"We have the Not-Hookshot."

Link took the weapon from Nadai and fired it at the tree. It reached and plunged into the wood. He grabbed Nadai and they went through the air to land on the turtle's back. Nadai frowned and took the weapon from Link.

"Just call it the Hookshot, will ya?"

Link smiled. "Fine with me."

"Are you two ready?" The Giant Turtle asked.

"Ready."

Time Stop:We decided against the boomerang-esque things Link should have had. We have Nadai after all to do ranged things.

Static: Besides, it doesn't make sense.

Time Stop: Quite Right.

Static: Please Review!