Chapter Five
Professor: Hi everyone! Sorry it has taken so long to finally update this story. I don't plan on ever abandoning my stories, but for a while it was very difficult to post anything. Long story.
Anyway, hope you enjoy this chapter! Sorry for any spelling or grammar mistakes!
Zelda waited all of five minutes after the younger man left before she jumped up and ran for the door.
"Princess! Where are you going?!" Niko called after her, trying to jump up and follow her from where he sat pouring tea at the table. Sadly his cane inhibited his speed.
"I'm not a princess, I don't even know what a princess is." Zelda grumbled, yanking the door open, "I need to find Link. And Impa. Figure out what happened."
"Alfonzo is going to Castle Town. He'll reach out to your teacher or Anjean and find you some help." Niko tried to reassure her.
Zelda sighed, trying not to snap at him. As far as she could tell, he was just a kindly old man who had her confused with someone else, he didn't deserve her anger, "It'll be better if I go with him then. I already feel better, I can travel."
She ran out the door before he could say another word, although he followed as quickly as he could.
Zelda looked around the quaint village quickly, not pausing to take in any of the details as she tried to find where the younger man, Alfonzo, had gone. A high pitched whistle blew through the air, catching her attention. Spinning around, Zelda saw what looked like the rest of the villagers gathered around a platform where the noise had originated. She couldn't see exactly what was going on, there were too many people in the way, but it was the best lead she had. Hiking her dress up a bit, Zelda took off at a run.
She made it to the crowd, full of people waving as if they were seeing someone off, just as a large contraption pulled forward from a building behind the platform. Zelda stopped in shock, gaping at the giant metal contraption. It looked like something the robots of the Lanaryu province would have built! One of their carts on tracks, but much bigger and self-propelling. How was that even possible? Had these people found another way of using the timeshift stones?
The contraption moved forward, slowly at first, but picking up speed. Zelda caught sight of Alfonzo up at the front, focused on some levers and gears.
She didn't think, she just ran, passing by the townsfolk and alongside the tracks for this contraption. It was getting faster and faster. Zelda reached out her hand, desperately trying to grab one of the bars on the side of it to haul herself up and ignoring the gasps from the people behind her and Niko's shouting.
Zelda's hand fumbled again, just barely missing the bar. The contraption picked up even more speed, pulling away from her. Her legs already felt like jelly after the day she'd had and her body was exhausted despite waking up from a thousand year nap. She didn't have the strength to run any faster than she already was.
But she couldn't just give up. With one last effort, Zelda jumped, both hands reaching out for the bar by the door. With a triumphant grin, she latched onto it.
The victory did not last long. The machine kept going and she was getting dragged alongside it, her feet getting flung around beneath her and coming far too close to the wheels, almost getting run over.
Panic filled her, but she held on, trying to pull herself inside.
A pair of strong hands grabbed her upper arms, yanking her up and into the machine. Zelda stumbled into someone, completely breathless.
"By all the Spirit Tracks in the world, what do you think you're doing?!" Alfonzo roared at her as the door clanged shut behind them.
"Coming…with you!" Zelda panted out.
"I told you to stay with Niko!"
"And I have a right to do what I want!" Zelda snapped back, glaring at him.
"Do you even realize how close you just came to dying?!"
She snorted, "Speaking as someone who has died within the last 24 hours, it's not really one of my top priorities right now. What is a top priority is finding Link, or at least someone who will believe me!"
Alfonzo stared at her in disbelief, "You DIED?"
Zelda shrugged, "Basically. Soul transferance magic lies on the very border of necromancy according to Impa. It's really a gray area and trust me, you don't want to argue with her about it."
Alfonzo finally seemed to be at a loss for words, unable to process exactly what she was saying. Zelda smiled up at him, "I'm coming with, whether you like it or not. After everything I've been through, I think I have a right to decide my own fate, wouldn't you agree?"
"I…I…"
"Perfect," She smirked, "How long until we get there?"
Link was going to kill Midna.
Really, he was.
Of all the times to teleport him without his consent, which she already had a very bad habit of doing, this had to have been the worst. Now she was stuck facing off against Ganondorf alone, probably planning on using the Fused Shadows to do so, which she could barely control, and he was who knows where.
He had felt Midna's teleport, a spell that made his entire body disintegrate although it felt more like he was covered in pins and needles, similar to the feeling of when his foot or arm fell asleep, and then he was dropped into a lake or river of some kind. The water had a very rough current and it was all he could do to hold on and try to swim away from it before his back slammed into what felt like a post, head snapping back from the force of it.
Link sat there for a long moment, waiting for the dizziness and pain to subside before slowly opening his eyes. The sun practically blinded him when he did so, but after his eyes adjusted, he was able to take a decent look around.
And promptly became lost.
He was leaning against some sort of pole in the center of a platform, the post he had bashed into presumably, but the platform was overlooking what seemed to be an ocean.
An actual ocean.
There weren't any oceans in Hyrule. The closest there was, was Lake Hylia. But no matter where you stood in the lake, you could always see the other side of it.
This…this just went on and on and on.
Link slowly stood up, grasping the railing of the platform and looking out in amazement.
There was just so much water.
It never seemed to end.
Where exactly had Midna taken him? And how had he gone from swimming against a current to being completely dry on a platform? What had happened?
Link heard voices behind him and turned around just in time to see one of the strangest sights that he had ever seen. Considering that he had seen multiple light spirits in the form of animals and a talking bird with a woman's head, his threshold for strangeness was quite high.
It was a woman that seemed to be made of blue and purple fabric, with a bright green hat perched on her head, but the hat was sitting up and seemed to have a beak.
"Ok," he said, looking at them in shock, "Wasn't expecting that."
The hat looked down at the woman, "Is this one yours?"
She shook her head gently, "Negative. I thought that I had made that clear beforehand."
"Never hurts to double check." he huffed before turning to face Link again, "Hello there."
Link stood there gaping for a long moment, the hat and woman both waiting for a response. Finally, he gave a hesitant, "Hello."
"Confused?"
Link nodded.
"Allow us to explain." the woman said, but the hat squawked at her, "Let me explain, it'll be faster and simpler."
"I promise to be efficient."
"And confusing."
"Please clarify, how can one be confusing in an explanation?" she asked, tilting her head.
The hat somehow rolled his eyes, but Link spoke up before the increasingly weird to watch argument continued, "Sorry, who are both of you?"
"My designation is Fi and this is Ezlo." she answered quickly, "We were taken by the same phenomenon that we assume you experienced as well, landing us in this time period."
Link shook his head quickly, "No, I was teleported by my partner. She dropped me here."
The hat, Ezlo, gave the woman a strange look, "Is it possible that our theory is wrong and this is simply a teleportation spell?"
"Improbable, but I will reassess. One moment." she fell silent, staring ahead with her blank, pupil-less eyes. Link tried not to stare, unnerved by the sight.
"It only takes her a moment. Her mind works incredibly fast." Ezlo said in what Link was sure was meant to be a reassuring voice.
"Right…" Link muttered.
"Calculations complete." Fi spoke up, "Based on the shared information between us and the Great Deku Tree there is a less than 5% chance of our theory being incorrect. The most likely explanation is that this Link's teleportation spell was inadvertently hijacked by the time travel phenomenon."
Link's eyebrows went up at the explanation. Midna's spell was hijacked? Time travel phenomenon? What exactly was going on here?
Ezlo nodded in agreement, turning to Link, "Were you dropped into some kind of rough textured water with a strong current? Tossing you back and forth pretty easily until it stopped and you woke up here?"
"What-How did-Were you two behind that?!" Link burst out.
Fi shook her head, "Negative. As stated before, we were taken by the same event. We discovered each other two days ago on another island and, after meeting one of the inhabitants there, were able to come up with our current theory. All evidence points to support of it. We then left in search of one of the Heros for assistance."
"What she means to say is," Ezlo jumped in, seeing Link's wide eyes, "That the same thing happened to us. We know this is confusing, but we were fairly certain that someone like you would have had the same thing happen to them and we were hoping you could help us."
"Woah, woah, back up a minute." Link rubbed his forehead, "I don't even know what is happening. Midna's spell was hijacked, you two need help from me, there's an actual ocean right now which is impossible, and something about time travel?"
Fi nodded, "Affirmative."
Ezlo groaned, "You aren't helping!"
"Would someone just answer me?!" Link yelled.
Ezlo looked at him a little nervously, an expression Link honestly never thought a hat could have, "Sorry again for the confusion. I guess we've just had more time to adjust over the last two days."
Ezlo gestured to the floor for Fi and she took the hint, sitting down. Grudgingly, Link followed along, leaning back against the pole again.
"To the best of our knowledge, that rough water was some sort of time travel that we all fell into," Ezlo explained, hushing Fi as she tried to jump in with a more detailed analysis, "We don't know if there was some sort of spell involved or if it was consequences of someone else messing with the timestream. Fi's theory is that it is focused on the soul of the Hero, Link, you, being taken through time. The rest of us were nearby and were just caught up in the effects of it."
"The…rest of us?" Link asked, "Exactly how many of you are there?"
"Just us, as far as we know. But we haven't found either of our Links yet, but it is possible that they landed in other timelines than this one."
"Ok, going back to the multiple Links thing, what do you mean by that?"
"I believe that I should answer this one," Fi stated. Ezlo deferred to her knowledge. "In my time period, before Hyrule was established, Demise, the god of evil, waged war upon the land. My master, Link, was chosen by the goddess Hylia to defeat him. He succeeded, but not before Demise cast a curse upon Link's soul and Her Grace's soul. His hatred for them, his desire to end all living things, would always continue on, tied to their souls for eternity and cursing all three of them into an endless battle of reincarnation. This means that there are actually countless versions of Links, Zeldas, and versions of Demise's hatred spread all across time."
Link let that sink in for another long moment, taking a deep breath, "I'm…a reincarnated soul of the Hero?"
"Precisely." Fi nodded.
"The Hero from the legends?"
"Yes."
"And Ganondorf is a form of hatred that was manifested by…Demise?"
Fi nodded again.
"So I have another curse on my soul now?"
"...another?" Ezlo asked.
Link ignored him, "And somehow, you two are hoping that I can help fix this time travel mix up, even though I literally have no idea how to do that."
"It's the best lead we have currently." Fi responded.
Link scoffed quietly to himself, "Great." Then, louder, "And do you have any proof of any of this? Or are you expecting that I just take you at your word?"
"You don't believe us?!" Ezlo sputtered incredulously, obviously insulted.
"I didn't say I didn't believe you, but I don't want to just blindly accept something like this." Link growled at him, "Maybe talking hats don't care about that kind of thing, but I do, especially if it means that I suddenly have to deal with issues from other time periods!"
"Don't raise your voice at me! It's not like we asked to get dragged into this!"
"I didn't either! You came to me and asked for my help, remember?!"
"And this is-"
"I can provide proof," Fi interjected, cutting off Ezlo's probably sarcastic reply.
"You can" he sputtered at her, "Why didn't you earlier?!"
"It was impossible until now," Fi said simply before focusing on her sword. In a moment she had it floating around to land on her crossed legs.
Link stared at it in shock, mouth dropped open, "Th-That's-"
"The Master Sword, of which I am the spirit of." Fi stated.
Link turned his disbelief towards her, "The spirit of it?"
She nodded, "My Master, Link, helped turn me from the Goddess Sword into the Master Sword with the use of the Sacred Flames. Only Master Link may use me as a weapon."
Link moved slowly, reaching behind him to pull out his own sword. He laid it down across his lap.
Despite the obvious fact that there were thousands of years between the two time periods, the swords were exactly the same. The length, color of the hilt, the gemstone on it. They were exact copies. The only difference was that the sword on Fi's lap shown, sparkling along the blade. It wasn't that the light was reflecting off of it or it was better polished, it was like the blade itself was radiating a faint light. Why his wasn't doing that, he didn't know. Maybe because Fi was controlling hers? Or because she was outside the blade?
"Why haven't I met you before now? If you live in the blade, why haven't you spoken to me before?" he whispered.
Fi contemplated the question. In response, she reached out one of her flowing arms and rested it gently on Link's blade.
"It seems I am dormant in your time period, my purpose complete." she finally answered, "I was created to help defeat Demise. Once that was completed, my orders were to return to the blade and help power the blessing that Hylia placed upon it. I do not need to be conscious to do so, so it seems my soul fell dormant once my task was completed."
Link gave a shaky breath, "This is all happening, it's all real, isn't it?"
Fi nodded.
"Ok then," Link nodded as well, "Where do we go from here then?"
"You'll help?" Ezlo watched him excitedly.
Link smirked at him, all previous anger gone, "I'm the hero, aren't I?"
Zelda fell through some kind of liquid, quickly losing her sense of direction. She kept her eyes shut, but eventually the need to breath overpowered her and she gasped for breath. She expected the rough water to flood in, but instead, it seemed like regular air filled her lungs.
She focused on trying to catch her breath, but as soon as she did that, she started falling again, but this time, through air, the water gone. Forcing her eyes open, Zelda saw that she was plummeting, clouds surrounding her in every direction, except for right underneath her. Some kind of creature was moving underneath her. Was it flying?
She didn't have time to concentrate on that part. She was rapidly approaching the creature's head and was going to crash if she didn't do something.
The creature, it looked like a large whale, had some sort of shell on its back, extending up to its forehead. Zelda reached for her magic. Link wasn't the only one who had been blessed by the great fairies and Impa had taught her many spells, along with properly harnessing and using them. Both of those together and Zelda was able to cast Farore's Wind, pushing her to land on the shell of the creature, but slowing her down enough to prevent injury.
She stumbled a little on the landing and, because fate was a cruel mistress, the sky whale moved at the same moment, diving. It was just a few feet, but it was enough to make a difference and Zelda fell over the edge. Only her reflexes, honed by training and hiding as Sheik, saved her, grasping onto the ledge of the shell. Zelda found herself hanging from it, staring straight into the giant eye of the creature she had just landed on.
"Ho ho ho!" the creature laughed, "Normally you lot are much better at landing on me!"
Zelda just blinked in confusion.
Sorry, I love cliffhangers.