Chapter Twelve

Link was fairly certain that he was lost.

This was new for him. Normally he had a great sense of direction. Traveling all around Hyrule by himself meant that he had to keep track of where he was at all times.

Granted, he wasn't completely by himself, but the navigation had been left completely to him. Zelda was horrible at directions. He thought that it was cheating if you could just fly up and use the height to find a nearby landmark.

That was getting lucky, not navigational skill.

There was also the fact that Alfonzo had spent years drumming map-reading and navigating lessons into his head so that Link could get his certification.

Suffice it to say, Link didn't get lost. He had a great sense of direction.

Which is why this was so confusing. Link stopped next to a tree, hands on his hips as he looked at it critically. An hour ago, when he had first suspected that he was going in circles, he had tied an old sock to one of its branches in an attempt to mark his path. After that, he had made sure to walk in as straight a line as possible. However, he was right back here again, it didn't make any sense.

Link had been hiking through this forest all morning, ever since he had woken up. He definitely should've made it out by now, or at least made a lot of progress for it. The confusion was slowly building towards frustration. The only times he had ever felt like this was when he'd been driving through the desert caves, making his way to the Sand Sanctuary, or when he'd had to get through the Lost Woods to get to the Forest Sanctuary.

He had tried every trick he could think of that had worked in both of those situations, however neither of them worked. In the desert, there were limited options to take and so, through trial and error, he'd finally mapped out the caves and how they worked. With the Lost Woods, he'd gotten advice from the people in Whittleton about using the trees to navigate.

He attempted both methods, but he was still stuck here. Link glared at the sock as if it was the cause of all of his problems.

He would have assumed that he was in the Lost Woods again immediately, except he knew that the Woods had stopped acting like a maze as soon as he'd cleared the Forest Temple. After that, he could navigate through it normally. This? This was like he had never been to the Temple in the first place!

Link groaned, finally admitting to himself that maybe he should take a page out of Zelda's book. It was the only thing that he hadn't done yet. He rolled his shoulders and grabbed the lowest branch of the tree. It was fairly tall and hopefully he could find any sort of landmark to get him to get him out of this stupid forest. He needed to find Zelda, find his train, figure out what had happened with Malladus. He didn't have time to wander around a forest for days on end.

Grunting with the exertion, Link pulled himself up branch after branch. He was fairly short for his age and climbing tall trees like this wasn't easy. He finally got to the top and wiped away some sweat, turning to look around to see if he could find anything familiar.

He looked on in confusion though. He could see the castle, but it was farther south than he thought it would be. He must be near the north part of the forest, before it merged into the Snow Realm. He couldn't see the Snow Realm from here, but it was entirely possible that the trees were blocking his view from it.

The most confusing part though was that he couldn't see the Tower of Spirits at all. Even when it had been attacked and broken up, the pieces had still floated in the air, easily visible from anywhere in the kingdom.

Link frowned. Malladus and Cole must've done something. That would explain how he had woken up in the Lost Woods and why they were acting like a magical maze all over again, as well as the Tower disappearing. He could only hope that they hadn't done anything that couldn't be repaired. If he was lucky, they had moved it somewhere, maybe even the Dark Realm, instead of completely destroying it.

He grit his teeth at the thought. There was no way that they were getting away with this.

Link continued looking around, seeing small rooftops in the distance, right near the edge of the forest. That must be Whittleton. Making note of the direction, Link began climbing back down the tree as fast as he could. If all went well, he could be there by the end of the day and then catch a train back to the castle. Hopefully he'd find someone there who could explain what had happened and then he could start looking for his friends. His heart clenched as he thought of them. Byrne was being attacked and Zelda had been in the middle of reuniting with her body. He had no clue what may have happened to them or Anjean.

Link jumped the last couple of feet, bending his knees to absorb the impact. Looking back up, his heart fell. The sock on the branch was gone. The forest had changed on him again.

"Wait, so everyone in your time lives in an ocean?" Zelda asked excitedly.

"The Great Sea." Medli confirmed, nodding.

"So, no land, no surface, just islands floating on the water?"

"Yep! Do you…not have those?" she asked.

"We do, they just float in the sky, way above the cloud barrier." Zelda explained, "We've always had legends of the Surface below the clouds, but until the storm that blew me down, no one had ever seen it. Everyone thought it was a myth!"

"Oh my, how did you survive a fall like that? You don't have wings!"

Zelda's smile grew and she immediately launched into an explanation of Loftwings and how their society was built around them, before explaining what had happened when she fell.

Anjean watched them, smiling softly. They were in her personal chambers in the Tower, Alfonzo listening in with confusion as the two girls swapped stories. He seemed to be functioning in full disbelief, but otherwise ok. Anjean, having already heard Medli's version of events, kept an ear open for everything that Zelda was saying as she continued making tea for everyone.

"You have to be kidding, they actually grow little bushes?"

Zelda nodded, "On their backs! They're the cutest little things! A little afraid of everything, but overall, very sweet. Don't you have any forest creatures?"

"We have the Koroks, they live with the Great Deku Tree. Actually, their names are very similar," Medli said thoughtfully, "I wonder, if we really come from different time periods, if the Kikwi are the ancestors of the Koroks."

"What do Koroks look like?"

"Like tiny wooden trees, still growing, but they wear leaves like masks." Medli splayed out her feathers and held them up to her face in an approximation of what she was describing.

"It's possible." Zelda said, "I'm certainly not an expert, but they could at least be distantly related."

"Is any of this even possible?" Alfonzo whispered to Anjean.

"Of course it is." she huffed softly, "You've heard the legend of the Hero of Time, time magic certainly exists. Besides, we have records of Medli and her tribe from when New Hyrule was founded. Tetra herself told me of their journey to save the Great Sea."

Alfonzo looked uncomfortable at the history lesson.

Anjean sighed, "I know it's a lot to take in, but what else can we do? Both of those girls are innocent in all of this and the least we can do is try to help. Besides, helping them may also lead to getting our Link and Zelda back, as well as Byrne."

"Do we really want him back though?" Alfonzo asked, his expression clearly stating that he didn't want Byrne back without trying to hurt her feelings.

Anjean rewarded his stupid question with a 'whack' on his head.

"Hey!" he groaned, rubbing the spot. Zelda and Medli stopped their conversation, looking at them in surprise.

"Byrne is my apprentice and he was helping us defeat Malladus."

"He also tried to kill me and helped kidnap Her Majesty!"

"She's forgiven him and so should you!"

"He was trying to resurrect Malladus!"

"And now he's seen the error of his ways! He helped us find him and helped Link in the battle!"

"And that makes everything ok?!"

"If I say it does!" Anjean glared at him. Alfonzo shrunk a little before her, "I know when my apprentice is being genuine! He regrets his actions! He's determined to make up for his mistakes! That is the end of the conversation, do you hear me?!"

Slowly, he nodded. Anjean huffed in satisfaction, turning back to the teapot, which had started to whistle. She brought it over to the couch where the two girls sat, "My apologies for all of that. Things in this world have been…difficult as of late."

"It's alright," Zelda muttered, looking at Alfonzo awkwardly as he took the seat opposite of them. "We got distracted talking about our own homes, we completely forgot to ask about this one."

"Although, it is nice to know that Link and Tetra succeed in their goals." Medli put in softly.

Anjean smiled, "Yes it is. I have to say, I do miss Tetra. She was a dear friend of mine."

"It's strange to think that we both know her, just at different points in time."

"That, more than anything, helps prove our timeline theory." Zelda said, "I wonder how many other people have fallen through to other times."

"I'm afraid I don't know how to answer that." Anjean shook her head, "Time magic is complicated on a good day. A situation like this, I don't know how we'd even begin."

"We have a Gate of Time back in my time." Zelda said, "Do you have anything like that here? Could we use it to get home?"

She shook her head again, "If we ever had one, it has long since been destroyed."

"Is there any expert on time magic in New Hyrule?" Alfonzo wondered.

"Rael would be the closest we have." She answered, "He enjoys studying any subject he can, it has always been a hobby of his. That being said, he is far, far from an expert."

"If I may," Medli said softly, "Link once told me that when he visited the original Hyrule, beneath the ocean, everything was frozen in time, at least until he removed the Master Sword. If that really was a form of time magic, could we possibly find a clue there?"

"I don't believe so. When they arrived here, Tetra and Link told me all about their adventures, including things that haven't happened in your time yet." Anjean said, "One of which was their defeat of Ganondorf. In doing so, the King of Hyrule wished on the Triforce to wash away the old kingdom, to make hope for a new one. Even if we could get there, I'm afraid any clues we'd hope to find would be long gone. We'd have to travel to your time period for that plan to work."

Medli sighed, shoulders slumping. Zelda grabbed her hand and gave her an encouraging smile, "It was a good idea."

"We need a better one to get home though."

"We'll figure it out." Anjean reassured her, "We just need to think a little harder."

Zelda's eyebrows furrowed in thought, "One of you mentioned a Dark Realm earlier, right? It might be dangerous, but if whoever did this is in the Dark Realm, could we track them down and stop them?"

"Absolutely not." Alfonzo said immediately, "It's too dangerous."

Zelda rolled her eyes at him, "I've been in plenty of dangerous situations. So has Medli."

"That doesn't mean I'm going to let you waltz right into another." he growled out.

"I wasn't aware we needed you to 'let us' do anything." Zelda glared.

Alfonzo returned the glare unflinchingly, "The last time I let a Zelda go into a knowingly dangerous situation, she ended up kidnapped and separated from her body."

"You got taken by surprise by people that Anjean has said aren't even in this time anymore. It'll be perfectly safe."

"No it won't! If whoever is behind this can destroy time, then they are ten times as dangerous as Cole and Malladus! We aren't going to meet them head on in the Dark Realm of all places, especially when we are this unprepared, and that's final!" he yelled, very adamant.

"He has multiple good points." Anjean spoke up, cutting off Zelda's angry reply, "Going into the Dark Realm now would be suicide."

"What would you suggest then?" Zelda huffed.

Anjean was quiet, thinking over all their options, "Honestly? I'm not sure. We don't have nearly enough information to make a proper plan. Our best hope may be reaching out to Rael and seeing if he can shed any light on the situation."

Alfonzo nodded his agreement, "I can go get him. It'll take a day or two, tops."

"Can we come?" Medli asked shyly, "At least if we come with you, we'll feel like we're doing something to help."

Zelda quickly voiced her agreement.

"I have no objections." Anjean said.

Alfonzo groaned, "Fine, but you have to listen to me the entire way there and back. No more jumping on and off trains and no distracting me while I drive!"

Zelda grinned, "Deal."

Link took a deep breath, feeling nervous. It wasn't every day that you met another version of yourself and he had no frame of reference for how this conversation would go.

But if there was anything that he had learned from his adventure, it was that you couldn't waste time. It was better to just get it over with.

He took one more deep breath and finally knocked on the door of the small house in front of him. He heard shuffling almost immediately, a 'thump' and what sounded like a word that Navi would've punished him just for knowing, let alone saying, before the door swung open.

An older man with a white beard and a bandana stood there, looking at him critically.

"What in Din's name happened to you?"

"It's complicated. I should probably explain-"

"Yeah you should! It's been nearly a week since you left to save the princess and now you show up looking like you hit three growth spurts at once!" the man cut him off before grabbing his shoulder and dragging him inside, "I want a proper explanation, you hear me? And this time, keep that hat of yours quiet!"

"My…hat?" he muttered, confused.

The man, Link could only assume that this was the other Link's uncle that Hailey and Gale had mentioned, shoved him over to some chairs in the corner, "Well come on, sit down already! I'll make some food while you start talking."

"Sir, I think you're mistaken. See, I'm not-"

He cut Link off again, "'Sir'? Since when do you call me 'sir'?"

"I can explain. See-"

"Then get to it." he huffed, turning to focus on the ingredients in front of him. He quickly started putting together two sandwiches.

"It's confusing, but I'm not the Link you know. I am Link, and we do look alike, but I'm not your Link." he said quickly before the other man could interrupt him again. He braced himself for the response.

The other Link's uncle turned to look at him. His gaze wasn't harsh, but it was steady, examining him. Link tried very hard not to squirm under the gaze, but wasn't sure that he was all that successful.

"You want to try to explain that?" he finally said.

"I…don't know what happened." Link admitted, "I was in Hyrule, but not this Hyrule. I was fighting someone named Ganondorf and as soon as we had him sealed away, I suddenly fell into this strange water. Next thing I know, I'm waking up in this place with these girls healing me. They told me about the Link of this Hyrule and how he was fighting someone named Vaati. I thought that if I found this other Link then maybe I could figure out what happened to me. They told me he lived here."

He nodded along to Link's explanation, listening intently. When he was done, the man turned back to the sandwiches. In moments they were done. He brought one over and set it in front of Link, "Dig in. If those girls only healed you with potions, your stomach is a mess. You need some real food."

"You-You believe me?" Link asked.

He shrugged, "Honestly, I've heard weirder. My nephew has a hat that talks and can cast magic. After meeting that, I learned to just start going with it. It stops the headaches."

"That's…helpful." Link muttered.

He gestured to the sandwich, "I mean it, dig in."

Link took the advice eagerly. Despite how many potions he'd been forced to drink, he was starving and as simple as it may have been, the sandwich looked amazing.

The two of them ate in silence for a few minutes. When they finally finished, the other Link's uncle leaned back in his chair, watching him intently again. "So, another Link, another Hyrule, and you have no idea how you got here?"

Link shook his head.

"Do you know what's been going on here?"

"For the most part," Link said. "I don't have all the details, but I feel as if I have the gist of it."

He nodded, "Alright then. Well, my Link went to stop Vaati and save the princess a week ago. He hasn't come back. The castle and the king are back to normal, but no one has seen him or the princess since then. The soldiers are looking high and low for them."

Link felt himself deflate. So much for that idea.

"I don't know where he is and, sadly, I don't know how to help you." he continued talking, "Based on how things are going at the castle, it's a rupee toss for if the king can help you or not."

"Is there anyone who can help?" Link asked hopefully.

The man sighed, "The only ones I can think of are the Picori. They're the magic experts in the kingdom and Link, my Link, has gotten help from them on multiple occasions."

"Ok, I'll go to them then." Link decided, "Where can I find them?"

He snorted, "That may be a problem."

"How so?"

"They live in the Minish Woods, but they're tiny. The biggest of them are still smaller than your thumb. Even then, you won't be able to find them. They can only be seen by children."

Link's eyes widened, "They what?"

He nodded, "It's why they had to send my Link. He was the only child they could trust to be responsible enough to handle the job."

"How old is he?" Link asked hesitantly.

"Eight. Nine in a couple of months."

'Not much younger than me then.' Link thought to himself. At this point he was questioning Hyrule's decision making if multiple versions of them were sending children on these dangerous missions. Then again, Link was still technically only 10 himself, even if he did look much older than that.

'Wait, mentally, I'm still 10! I might be able to see the Picori!' Link thought excitedly. He stood up, smiling, "I'm still going to go. I think I have a way that will let me see them."

The other man sighed, "Ok then. Your choice. I'll get you a map, but do me a favor?"

"Of course."

"Keep an eye out for my boy, will you?"

Link nodded, "I promise."

Professor: Guest review FCL: Thank you so much for your reviews! I love them! I'm glad that you are enjoying the story so much! It is a lot and I have so many notes just to keep things straight and so many plot bunnies that keep changing things on me lol. I've even had to replay and beat certain Zelda games all over again just for this story (*mock gasps* what a chore!) Anyway, thank you for catching the fact that I left Minish Cap Zelda off the list in the previous chapter. I have gone back and fixed it. Hope you enjoyed this chapter too!