I woke up on the hard ground. Gods, was my mind foggy. I shook my head, trying to get rid of my clouded thoughts and mind. I tried to move my arms, but I felt incredibly weird about it. My eyes opened, and I took in the sight around me.

Stone bricks and metal bars, it appeared that I was in a prison of some sort. A metal chain attached one of my furred legs to the ground- furred legs?

I looked down upon myself. It appears that I'm covered in white fur, with black rosette spots covering them. My arms seemed to have been replaced by forelegs, and it appeared that I had been turned into some sort of quadruped animal. I opened my mouth, a small yowl coming out. Maybe I had become some kind of cat? A jaguar or a panther perhaps?

Whatever I was, Zach was nowhere to be seen, and given the random addition of gloominess to the air of the dungeon, the darkness had probably turned both him and I into some sort of animal. I needed to get out of this prison. I tried to break the metal chain with force, no dice. It wouldn't be big enough to slip around my newfound enormous paw, that's for sure.

I tried to gnaw at the iron, feeling pretty silly with myself as nothing happened. Of course my teeth weren't going to cut through the metal, it's not like they were made out of diamonds.

A light giggle came from outside of the bars. I dropped the chain in my mouth and crouched, looking over in the direction of the sound. Another creature, this one looking quite impish stood there. It had some sort of strange stone helmet on top of its head. Its whole body was a swirl of black and white, with light teal markings glowing in the appearance of tattoos.

It smirked, and leapt into the cell. "I found you!" It said. I growled lightly at this strange creature. It didn't look dissimilar to the black creature that had pulled Zach and I through the wall, and I wasn't sure that the creature in front of me wasn't about to attack me.

"Oh, aren't you scary!" It said more than asked upon hearing my growl, as if toying with me. it wasn't as if I was going to be able to attack it from where I was, it had hopped right out of my range of movement.

"Are you sure that you want to be doing that? Snarling and glaring at me?" It paused, and when I continued my growl, it continued with, "Well, that's too bad… I was planning on helping you, if you were nice." It smiled at me, a glint in the one eye that was visible to me, it's other eye covered by the stone helmet.

I stopped my growl. If it had been going to attack me, then it wouldn't have bothered engaging in idle small talk, it would have just attacked, maybe used some magic power to blow me into a million pieces or something.

"Eee hee! That's much better! You humans are obedient to a fault, aren't you?" How was stopping my growling considered obedience? If me stopping my growling was being nice, and being nice was what was needed in order for the strange creature to help me, then logic says that I stop growling in order to get help, right? I didn't need to think too hard into this.

"Although…" It continued, looking pensive for a moment before tapping my snout, "You really aren't a human anymore, are you? You're a beast! Eee hee!" I glared at the creature, but didn't do anything. Clearly it was looking for some sort of rise out of me as it smiled. It took a couple of steps back and raised its hands in front of it, gathering some sort of energy before releasing it at me, breaking the chain that linked me to the floor.

I recoiled for a moment, thinking that it might have attacked me before I realized that it had in fact unbound me from the floor. "You look kind of surprised! Eee hee hee!" It jumped into the air, gliding backwards. "I bet you're wondering where we are? Well," it phased through the bar as if they were made of water and continued, "I'll make you a deal. If you can get over here, maybe I'll tell you!"

It smirked at me and gave a yawn before giggling once more. I looked around the cell, trying to see if there was any way out of it. The metal bars were tightly knit together, and since I was now a cat I might be able to squeeze my way through; but I could very easily get myself stuck. There appeared to be a broken wooden box in the corner, and I got the feeling that I could easily break it if I tried.

What could I do to break it? My teeth are in fact very sharp, they could be used to maybe chew through something, but not a wooden box. My claws came out, and I knew that I could rip the skin from an animal's hide with them. My tail felt powerful, powerful enough that I could smash something if I were able to whip it around fast enough. Maybe I could-

A crash could be heard as I spun on the spot, my tail breaking through the box as though a knife through butter. It crumpled into pieces, leaving an empty space in its wake, allowing me to see the broken bars and a hole in the metal. It was just big enough for me to properly squeeze myself through, much bigger than the space in between the bars.

I dug at the ground, feeling the loose dirt move around my paws as I made the hole wide enough for me to exit the prison cell. As I wiggled my way out, I became aware of the fact that the imp was no longer around. I pushed forward, freeing myself completely. Then I felt a THUMP on my back, and I jumped probably five feet in the air trying to knock whatever it was off before I realize that the creature had latched itself to me, holding onto my fur.

"Calm down," It said, and when I stopped moving it patted my head. "It looks like you aren't completely stupid after all!" It leaned down and scratched behind my ears. "Listen, I like you, so I think that I'll get you out of here. Plus we have to go and find your friend with the shiny hand too! But in exchange for my help, you have to do exactly what I say! If you need anything from me, just ask. So we're all good, then let's go!" at this it smacked my back, signaling that I ought to move onwards.

What a presumptuous creature. I mean, it did break my chains, so I figured that I would follow its lead for now. I walked around and found a side passageway out of my area of the dungeons, leading to an open area. Immediately to my right there was a glowing orb.

"Oh?" The imp inquired. "Isn't that funny. Eee hee hee! Want to see something interesting? You're a beast now, just hone your beast senses and poke around!"

Beast senses? What on earth was she talking about? Although… I could feel it. Something about the way I was looking at the world, like I was still viewing the world as a human. I could feel the wild cat inside of me, clawing to get out, to take control. My eyes slitted, and my vision darkened, creating a atmosphere of chaos. But in that chaos, I could understand the glowing orb for what it was, for I saw the outline of a soldier, holding a spear.

"I can't run any farther, that's enough right, I'm safe here? What was that noise, don't come any closer!"

I tried to touch the light, but my snout went right through him. As I walked away, the imp piped up.

"That was a spirit. the people of the land of light can't exist as they are in the twilight, so if you come across any more spirits, just hone your beast senses to listen to them, who knows what you can find out!"

I walked some more, before realizing that we were in some sort of sewer system. As I made my way down, I came across an inky black creature the size of a rat. As soon as it noticed me, it lunged, and my newfound animal instincts allowed me to grab it out of the air with my teeth and rip it to shreds. It also dissolved in a puff of smoke, and I was beginning to understand that creatures of darkness might not have a tie to the world as I understand it. Maybe there was some other realm that they were coming from?

As I made my way through, I raised the water flow to swim over some spikes and lowered it back down to make my way towards the exit. A couple of spirits were found along the way, but they simply cowered in fear of the black monsters that I dispatched. A single thought rose to my mind; where's Zach? If he had been in the dungeons, then the imp would've had me free him. Unless he wasn't in the dungeons, or unless the imp was lying about taking me to him and simply wanted to bring me into a trap.

As it jumped back on my back; it had gotten off to show me where to go, it said, "Where might we be? All of the spirits that we've passed seem to be soldiers? Well let's get out of here, ok?"

We walked a few paces and I found that we had entered a circular staircase, with parts of the stairwell crumbling from disuse or the decay from the magic that seemed to enshroud the land. I made my way up the stairs, careful to jump on ledges, luckily it seemed that I was able to jump fairly high, and tightrope walking across a particularly far jump instead of risking the long fall.

We made our way into an open room, and after taking down a couple of bats, I jumped to a couple of ledges and found an open window above a sealed door.

I walked outside, revealing dark skies that rained down on both the imp and I. We appeared to be in some sort of castle, although as a non-native, I had no idea where that might be in the world, it wasn't as if I had opened the map to look at it yet.

The imp stretched out its arms. "My my, would you look at the sky! Isn't the black cloud of twilight looking simply beautiful today? Do you know where we are yet? No? Well anyways, there's someone I want to introduce you to… but I'll need you to go to that tower over there in order to do it!"

A spirit was standing there, cowering in the rain. "Our poor Hyrule Castle, what has become of it? and those dark, sinister birds…" I looked out over the rooftops, and sure enough, there were some black birds that spiraled above, just waiting for someone or something to challenge it.

I leapt from rooftop to rooftop; taking down the inky black birds one by one. Luckily, my beast form knew how to hunt, how to lung into the air to take down prey, and I used those skills to take down the flying birds. As I made my way over to the tower that the creature on my back had pointed out, I couldn't help but wonder who the imp would want me to meet. I was almost expecting at this point for the whole ordeal to be a trap, but then it probably wouldn't have freed me by breaking the chains, and would have just opened the lock with a key. Speaking of which, part of the shackle was still around my front paw.

I walked into the tower that it had pointed out to me, and went up the spiral staircase and entered the room at the top. Inside was a bed and a fireplace, as well as a cloaked figure talking to a wolf at the window.

A wolf? Could it be? "Zach!" I said, not knowing how on earth the meow that came out of my mouth sounded like a person's name to me. The wolf turned to me and gave a toothy grin.

"Russell, is that you? Sporting the snow leopard huh?" Snow leopard was I? Well at least it was something strong, and not a weak animal like a mouse.

"And you're a wolf, how'd that happen?"

The cloaked figure dropped her hood. "Midna, I didn't expect to see you again so soon."

The imp smirked. "You remembered my name! What an honor for me!"

"So," The woman said, "These are the ones that you were searching for."

"They're not exactly what I had in mind, but I guess they'll do."

The woman leaned down, looking at my still shackled paw. "You were imprisoned?" I nodded in affirmation. "I am sorry."

Midna interrupted. "They have no idea where they are or what's going on, so why don't you explain what you've managed to do? You owe them that much at least, Twilight Princess!"

The woman looked a little sad, and begun her tale.

"Listen carefully, this was once the land of Hyrule, the land where the power of the gods was said to slumber. But that blessed kingdom has been transformed by the king that rules the twilight. It has been turned into a realm of shadows, filled with creatures that shun the light."

She explained how show was the princess of the land, and how the black monsters came out of nowhere, killing guards left and right as a man with a horrid cloak and mask came forth, demanding that she either surrender the kingdom to him or that she and her subjects would die. To her, it was a simple choice of surrender, she would rather everyone in Hyrule stay living and fall into darkness than have the entire land slaughtered. And so, twilight enshrouded the land, and without light, the people became as spirits.

And now, as spirits, they live on, unaware of anything but the nameless fear that is the world around them, unaware that they cannot change their destinies by themselves.

For some odd reason, only she, Princess Zelda, and the two of us, Zach and I, were not turned into spirits as far as she knew.

"Don't be so sad!" Midna piped up. "We actually find it quite livable, I mean, is perpetual twilight really all that bad?"

"Midna," The princess said, "This isn't a time for levity, the shadow beasts have been searching far and wide for you. And for what reason?"

Midna shrugged. "Why indeed? You tell me!" And she cackled again, leaving little question in my mind that the imp was just as much a fugitive as I was to the twilit creatures.

The princess looked at Zach and me. "Time has grown short, the guard will soon make his rounds, you would do well to leaves before he makes his appearance. You must leave, quickly."

Zach followed me out of the room, and we exited the window that we had entered.

"So…" drawled Midna. "A promise is a promise, so I guess that I'll return you to the place where you first fumbled into the twilight. But are you sure that you should be going back? Are you sure that you aren't forgetting anything important?"

Images of the children that we kidnapped swam before my vision before I could help it, and I knew that Zach and I needed to save them.

"Well, I'd be happy to help you save them," said the imp in front of us. "But well, you'd have to be my servents, and like servants, you'd have to do exactly as I say! Why don't you go back, take a little time, and give it some thought?"

Suddenly, Zach and I had been teleported back to the spring, where the ominous black portal overhead hung in the sky still. So that's what it was for, the twilight creatures could teleport to it at will.

"Oh, and there's one more thing," Midna's voice said. "Though you've returned to the world of light, you haven't transformed back into your former selves, and you won't anytime soon! Eee hee hee!"