Zelda hadn't shown up at school for two and a half weeks. This bothered Link, firstly out of concern for Zelda, and secondly out of need for her companionship. Eventually, he gave in and asked Ghirahim if he had any clue as to what was going on, to which he replied that his parents had received a message from the principal saying that Link had displayed belligerent behavior since the arrival of the Sheikah. Link's eyes widened in horror.

"You didn't tell me this before."

"I didn't know before. My parents just told me today."

"Wouldn't they tell you about any message they received from the school?"

"Apparently not. They don't really care. 'Who's Link,' is all they really asked."

Who is Link? He wondered this as he stared at the sky, streaked with thin, feeble clouds that peeked over the heads of white buildings. "You can tell them," he started, "that Link has no intention in interfering with federal business. As long as they don't interfere with that of my friends or me." Who was Link, really? He saw himself, at this moment, as a social vigilante, a meddler in others' matters. Overly sensitive; leaping into situations headfirst without any real knowledge of what he was getting himself into. Also, a victim. An outcast. Like Nabooru. Perhaps this was why he felt he had a duty to help her, because he was tired of seeing himself in such a weak position, in front of the psychologist's desk, telling half-truths; he wanted to help someone else out of it. Nabooru was right, he realized: he wasn't her friend, but rather her self-appointed guardian. He hung his head in shame at this fact.

"What?" asked Ghirahim.

"Oh, nothing."

"You look so dejected."

"Just preoccupied."

Link stopped in his tracks when he saw Nabooru holding a weapon, a gun, in her hands. It shone with a rich bronze color in the sunlight, crafted with the antique artfulness only the Gerudo would think to apply to a weapon. She examined it with objective preoccupation, tossing it from hand to hand almost nonchalantly. Link stayed well out of sight, hidden behind the building's corner, but he could see her visibly shaking. It was now or never. He knew full well her intention. Boldly, he stepped out from his hiding spot. "Nabooru," he called, but his voice was hoarse and raspy. She turned to see him, panic in her face, her back to him, as she held the gun in front of her, hiding it.

"Oh, hi, Link," she giggled. "I was just...using the bathroom." She sped towards the girls' bathroom, which was close at hand and the easiest hiding spot for someone who didn't intend to hide for long. What a childish move. What hubris to think Link would fall for her thin deception.

"Wait! Nabooru!" he called after her, sprinting to catch up. "Wait!" She entered the bathroom and rounded the corner, a flash of red hair disappearing against a background of white tiles. "Goddamn it, get back here," Link muttered under his breath. She had a gun. She had a goddamn gun, and she was going to use it.

If only he could muster the courage to follow her in. He could hear Fi laughing at the scenario. He wondered if Nabooru had chemistry today.

Without allowing time for an internal argument, he hurried to the bathroom and slipped in quietly. He could hear wild laughter, tumultuous sobs. He was shaking now, and grasped the wall with freezing fingers as he peered around. There she was, tears pouring from her bronze eyes, leaning over the sink and studying her contorted face in the mirror. "Do it," she said through clenched teeth. She slammed her jaw closed and turned her head upward, glaring at herself in the glass with a queenly, commanding gaze. "I said, do it!" she forced through the grate of her teeth. She glared at herself so intensely, Link thought her eyes would burst. Those beautiful golden eyes.

Come on, come on, Link told himself. You can't let this happen.

"I am nothing," she choked. "The world hates me. I am hated." Link was half-glad that she was doubtful of her own decision. He hoped that somehow, she would give up, and find him waiting for her, and be angry at him, yet restored of her will to live. "I am hated. Despised. Spit upon." There was a little bayonet on the end of the gun, which she stroked across her bare forearm, letting a thick stream of blood trickle down into the sink, where it settled like tar. All colors seemed to become a bit more vivid. His head throbbed. He had forgotten that Gerudo blood was hot, thick, and black.

A silhouetted figure pounced upon him amongst the steam, her nimble legs wrapping around his torso, her mouth drinking from the flesh of his neck. He could feel sharp incisors nipping his skin, and producing a heat, a strange, focused heat. Warm blood poured down his body as his captor lapped it up like an animal. "Bite me, boy." He could hear his mother's screaming, and worse, his father's silence. His resounding silence that signaled a loss of hope. He couldn't see them through the steam, but he could see the blue gleam of a plasma whip at the ready. "I can't I can't," he cried, his voice echoing off the walls. The blood continued to pour. He felt weak. "Bite her," a voice demanded. He closed his eyes, his eyes stinging behind their lids, and sank his teeth viciously into the Gerudo's shoulder. Warm blood. Hot blood. A metallic taste in his mouth, a thickness, a layer that choked him, coated his teeth. "More," said the monster, kissing the spot on his neck she had bitten, caressing his torso. Her hands burned. "More."

"Nabooru, you can't."

She spun to face him, glaring, piercing him with sharp eyes. "You followed me in here," she said.

"Nabooru, put away the gun. You can't do this to yourself-"

He doubled over. She had punched him solidly in the gut, and was now standing over him like one of his captors. "You dumbass. You followed me in here, you dumbass." She punched him again, kneed him in the face. "Leave me..." A shoe to the shin. "The fuck..." Link curled up against the wall, his back turned to her, as she kicked him, the full force of her heel digging into his spine and leaving him writhing. "Alone!" She stomped on his ribs. He thought he heard a crack. She raised the gun to her head and closed her eyes, clenching her teeth. But despite the pain, Link crawled up the wall to his feet and delivered a swift blow to her head. She grasped it, screaming, and dropped the gun. "Fuck you. Fuck you. Get away from me." Screaming, incessant screaming. Link picked up the gun and pointed it at Nabooru.

What a sweet reversal of power. "Don't move or you're dead, you fucking-"

She had leaped forward again, pushing all the air out of him. He toppled to the ground, where she grasped his neck. His hands flailed to remove hers, her head enshrouded in a mane of flame. He pulled his knees up, and wheezing, yelling through his clenched throat, he launched her off of him and grabbed hold of the gun again. "Like I said. Don't make a move." Her arm was still bleeding. It was getting all over her T-shirt. Suddenly she looked so small. What had it been like to drink that blood. "Don't move." He moved in, swiftly and smoothly, and took her arm, pressed his lips to the drain of blood.

"Sick bastard," she whispered, but she didn't struggle to escape his grip. Suddenly, he saw everything. They, a species of females with only one male every generation, would want young bodies upon which to feast, and it fell to me to satisfy their twisted desires. How disgustingly contrived. "Now I see why you wanted me. Sick, fucking bastard."

Looking out the window. The stars; how vast. How vast he had felt. He had lived a pampered life. Hyrule, with its forests and gardens, land of natural wildlife; his inspiration. His songs were of these things, how little he thought of them now. A small bee dodging in and out of flowers was a song. He was not a song. He was a channel for songs, his songs were of these things.

Zelda knew him before then. He knew him before her birth, before his birth, she was made to know him. Somewhere, Nayru looked upon them. "They have left Skyloft."

"Why?"

"Financial situation."

Hyrule, with its deer and clear skies, and the ever-present stars; the land of natural wildlife. Humans were but an insignificant speck, but how beautiful a morsel. What an illusion is power. He had felt vast. The stars had seemed vaster. A ship, enshrouded in a clean light from the blackness of space, but a greater ship overtook it, an armed ship. What an illusion is power. Hyrule had six moons. They stripped him, tortured him, raped him, their hands clawing at him for a taste. He could barely remember his parents, their faces behind a veil of bright, thin, frail trees. Their leaves glowing green in the sunlight. Such thin, fragile sheets of life.

Somewhere outside, Ghirahim was waiting. In a class. Link had left to use the bathroom. "Hello?" came a shy voice.

"Don't come in."

"What's going on in here? Is everything-" Laura Hopkins entered. "Link," she whispered. He felt himself grow weaker. He dropped to the ground against his will. Nabooru dropped beside him. Blood was everywhere. All over the floor, spread over the clean white tile. "Link, how...you...how could you?" She rushed, in a panic, out of the bathroom. There would be more, Link knew this, at least.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, really, I didn't mean to, it all just sort of came back to me." He used his last weak slivers of breath to say this.

Nabooru slid to the floor, her head rolled back in exhaustion. "I...I'm sorry," came her reply. What did she have to be sorry for? Link's vision was blurry. His bruised ribs hurt tremendously, and his head throbbed with an overwhelming sense of guilt and disbelief. He had returned to that state, to that miserable state, and he regretted it fully. Now he had something to regret. Now he could blame himself. He had exploded. His story had exploded. "I'm sorry, Link, I can't, I just can't." Thank God the gun was out of her reach.