Chapter 45: By Rail
Other than avoiding a couple of the oddly yellowed chuchus, and cutting his way through another handful of aracha, Link's journey through the predawn night was largely uneventful. The city's strange buildings loomed above him, most still largely intact but some collapsed by time, and once he had to detour around a street completely blocked, both by rubble and by the sand that built up over and within the rubble. Apart from his footsteps and breathing, the occasional insect, and the soft whispering and rushing of the wind above the buildings, it was silent. A couple of times, the thin clouds above thinned enough that he could see one or two of the brightest stars through them, and the faint glow of the waning moon was never completely hidden.
The blocky shapes before him seemed higher than before, dark silhouettes against the slowly lightening sky. On the north side, Link thought he could see a narrow protrusion, perhaps a bridge leading gently down. Fi's sense of directly led him unerringly towards it, and before long he was climbing the small hill, up towards some sort of long, flat structure.
The building Fi led him to was long and low, wide doorways standing open. Sand had blown in, even there, but as Link entered and squinted about in the gloom, he could see it hadn't spread overly far from the doorway. The space he found himself in was huge and cavernous, pillars supporting the ceiling in places – a ceiling that seemed slightly lighter than it should, as if perhaps it were made from dirty glass.
"What is this place, Fi?" Even the whisper sent echoes shivering around the vast, dark hall.
This is the northern levirail station, Master. You must now determine whether any of the remaining levitrains have the capacity to transport you northward. Assessing the structural integrity of the station, I confirm that they are likely to have been sheltered from significant weathering.
Link nodded, lighting his lantern and slowly pacing forwards. Sand and dust and time dulled everything, and he could see little beyond the range of his light. Shapes loomed out of the shadows, small buildings within a building, then a kind of shallow trench, perhaps waist-deep, with a pair of thicker, wider rails than those the carts had used at its foot. He squinted into the darkness: was there another one beyond?
Multiple levirails pass through or terminate in this location, Master, Fi confirmed. I detect levitrains present upon three of the tracks.
Link nodded, drawing his sword. Its faint glow added little to his lantern light, but the feel of it in his hand, the certainty that Fi was with him as he searched for something he didn't know how to recognise, was reassuring.
"Which way?" he murmured, and once again his voice set up a rush of whispering echoes, dying away only slowly. The dirty light from above was brightening slowly as the sun rose, but not enough for him to really see by.
Fi sprang from the sword, glowing faintly with a light that illuminated nothing but herself. Her musical voice set off no echoes as she spoke. "I detect three levitrains in the immediate vicinity." She gestured gracefully onwards into the gloom. "I cannot determine their status at this range."
Link nodded, walking in the direction she had indicated. He jumped down into the first trench; scrambled up again on the far side; did the same to cross the second. The paved ground was gritty with dust and stray sand, and everything was silent. A dark shape loomed ahead of him where he had expected a third trench, a long oblong with its top half his own height again above his head and still far below the grime-coated glass ceiling. A subtle impulse tugged him towards it, another prompting from Fi.
"Is that a levitrain?" Link murmured.
"Yes, Master," she confirmed, still floating alongside him. "You will need to enter at the rightmost end. The doors no longer have power, but should still possess manual release levers. I have additionally updated my assessment of the probability that they are still functional or will be simple to restore to 90%. I detect that the dust on the far side of this levitrain has been significantly disturbed recently, implying that there was another levitrain present which has now departed."
"Zelda," Link breathed. "It has to be."
"I cannot confirm this with certainty, Master, as any auras in this location have been concealed. However, I estimate the probability that you are correct at 95%."
Link smiled, his steps a little lighter as he turned along the side of the levitrain. There was a small gap between it and the ground on which he stood, which if it moved he supposed there would have to be; presumably it was resting on another of the thick rails he had seen in the other trenches. Its side was dull, made of the same odd not-quite-metallic material so much in the desert seemed to be, and set with small windows at regular intervals. A pair of doors, between them as wide as they were high, passed him by, but he obeyed Fi's silent instruction to continue, past a point where the first part of the levitrain abruptly ended and for less than half a pace Link could see through the gap to the shadowy half-light beyond. The levitrain as a whole continued, however, with some sort of huge clamp or lock at the bottom of the gap connecting it to the next part. Again, Link came to a door, and this time Fi halted to gesture to it.
"You should enter the levitrain here to inspect the control station and engine compartment. An emergency release lever is provided to the right of the door."
Link studied the wall of the levitrain and nodded, seeing the time-dulled outline around what was probably a recess that held the lever. Made for hands bigger than his own, it came open stiffly and with a grating complaint when he hooked his fingers under it and pulled, revealing a long and simple lever in the cavity behind. Indecipherable squiggles in the back of the cavity doubtless said something, but he wasn't sure what.
"What's that say?"
"For emergency access, pull lever," Fi recited calmly. "Replace lever to upright position to enable door locking before engaging locomotion."
Locomotion? Even as he wondered at the last word, Link grasped the lever, pulling it towards himself. It resisted, and he threw his weight into it, until it abruptly jolted outwards with a heavy clunk. Beside it, in time with it, the door abruptly popped out of its frame and slid leftwards, a gap opening between it and the wall big enough to get his arm through. Pleased by the success, he gripped the edge of the door and pulled sideways, trying to slide it further. Whatever runners it slid on squealed in protest, but it grated slowly aside until the gap was wide enough for Link to step through and he stopped pulling on it with a breath of relief, shaking his hands out.
The floor of the levitrain was quite a big step down from the ground he'd been standing on. Taking his lantern from his belt and holding it up, Link stepped cautiously into the space inside: a short corridor that ran directly from his side of the levitrain to the other. In the exact middle were two doorways: one to the left and one to the right.
"The left-hand door will permit you to access the power core and associated mechanisms. The right-hand door leads to the manual controls," Fi informed him, drifting silently down beside him.
"Left first, then?" Link ventured, and Fi inclined her head. Inside the narrow space of the levitrain, his voice echoed much less than it had outside.
Unlike the outside door, this one had a kind of handle set into it that Link was able to yank sideways, coughing a little at the dust. The door slid slowly and gratingly aside, opening into one of the most cramped spaces he'd ever seen. Much of it seemed coiled and twisted, or ribbed, or made of long narrow metal plates stacked side by side – it looked like nothing Link had ever seen, save…
He frowned. Beedle's Airshop…?
"The power core here is non-functional, Master Link. I detect that it has deteriorated with time. From the degradation, I estimate that it has been inoperable for approximately two hundred years."
Link glanced over his shoulder and found Fi so close he felt the tip of his nose would touch her if he so much as breathed. Surprised, he reflexively leant away slightly, Fi's impassively calm expression unchanging.
"So we need to check another one? Or can we do something like what we did before, in the mines? If we can find another power core?"
Fi nodded. "It is unlikely that the levitrain that has departed was in a significantly better condition. It is therefore probable that there is a supply of functional power cores in this vicinity. You will need to locate one and replace the power core present here."
Link, too, nodded. That made sense, inasmuch as he understood any of the machinery around him. As he turned and climbed the high step back out of the levitrain, he commented "You know, Beedle has some machinery that looks a bit like this in his Airshop. He tells anyone who listens how people said it wasn't possible to augment a failing power core. Do you think he has something similar?"
Fi floated up beside him, her head tilted. Despite her blank expression, Link thought she seemed to want to know more.
"It is possible, Master. I would need to conduct a fully detailed analysis of the 'Airshop' to reach a definitive conclusion. It is certain that Skyloft and the other islands were once inhabited by many of the same robots who built these or similar machines, and it is probable that they created more machines while upon the islands."
"You were there for that… weren't you?"
"I entered a state of dormancy shortly after the raising of the islands, Master Link. I did not directly perceive the majority of the subsequent events, although I retained a basic awareness of the more significant auras present upon Skyloft."
Her melodic voice was calm, but Link still decided to drop the subject. Fi always sounded calm, and he knew what had happened to her in the raising of the islands, that time out of legend.
"Where do you think we should look for power cores?"
Fi rotated as if spinning gently on her down-pointed toes, as though she were looking about the cavernous space. "Once you have replaced the emergency access lever, I recommend seeking out staff and maintenance areas. These are located…"
. . .
It had taken Link some time to find what he sought, and when he had, it had raised more questions. A large crate in an easily-accessed room had proven to contain some large, round objects that Fi confirmed were levitrain power cores, but not even she could tell him why they had been in what she told him was the stationmaster's office, an empty bin lying on its side beside them. Other than that two had been removed within the past day, she had no more information than Link did, something that left him even more bemused. The crate, Fi confirmed, had been in its place for at least eight hundred years, and probably longer. She had speculated that it must have been left for easy access by the last robots to leave the station, but she had made it very clear that it was only speculation.
Link had carried the heavy power cores back to the levitrain one at a time, and was just straightening from having set the second one down when an inexplicable chill shot down his spine.
Master Link. Fi's tone was flat and rapid. I detect the aura of the demon Ghirahim within the city. I calculate a 90% probability that he is tracking us in this direction. It is imperative that you complete the power core exchange rapidly.
Link took a sharp breath, tension settling into his bones. "Okay, Fi." He looked at the two cores, both lying in the corridor outside the cramped space he would be working in. Following the instructions she'd already given him, he drew the Goddess Sword and knelt, striking one of them hard with its pommel. Once again, he heard the sharp ring of metal on metal underscored by a deeper, more resonant note, and the wave of light washed over him with that momentary sensation of strange backwards queasiness, erasing centuries of imperceptibly-settling dust and grime, both inside the levitrain and outside it. Link glanced back over his shoulder, out of the door: the effect seemed to extend at least to the next trench. More than enough to cover this front section of the levitrain.
The box of tools he'd found and carried carefully in seemed similarly restored to pristine condition. None of them were quite shaped correctly to a human grip, but they were close enough that he could hold them, and that was all that mattered. Leaving his sword sheathed despite how much the spectre of Ghirahim's approach made him wish to draw it, Link stepped carefully into the small compartment and began to work, following Fi's careful directions about what he should unscrew, unbolt, or remove.
Before long, almost to his own surprise, they had the old power core out. Fi had warned him that it would not regain its former power even within the timeshift. Apparently, one of the few things immune to the effects of Timeshift Stone was the stone itself. Link grappled with the old core, lifting it awkwardly in the confined space, and managed to carefully swap it with another, the one he hadn't hit. Socketing it into the space he'd taken the other one from, careful to keep it at the same orientation, he followed the same instructions in reverse, connecting or closing one thing after another until, at last, a final cover screwed on over it.
Now press the red button immediately to your right, Master Link.
Link reached out and pressed it, and suddenly all sorts of little blank spaces lit up with different colours of light, another, brighter light blinking on above him and rendering the whole confined space as bright as day. After so long in the half-light, he blinked, shielding his eyes for a moment, and a strange hum filled the air, the floor almost seeming to sway under him as if it were rising briefly like a bird in flight.
"What's happening, Fi?!"
The levitrain is now active, Master. Its levitation capacity has engaged: we are now hovering above the levirail.
If Link hadn't been so tense, he would have let himself appreciate the wave of awe. He and Fi had done that.
Ghirahim continues to close on this location. I estimate that it will take him between ten and fifteen minutes to reach us at his current rate of travel.
"Then we've got to go." Link stood and stepped out of the doorway, which closed automatically and almost silently behind him. The door to the outside was shut, and the door ahead opened for him equally silently, although he had a definite sense that Fi had done something to it. "This is where you control it?"
The front of the levitrain had a strip of window all the way across it, set notably below Link's eye level. An angled surface below it held some buttons, and a lit screen displayed a digram and text he couldn't read.
That is correct, Master. Fi paused for an instant. However, a problem has been detected. The rear carriages are not receiving power. This is likely due to the extension of the levitrain outside the temporal distortion. You will need to uncouple the rear carriages. Use the screen to control the carriage linkages by touching the one you wish to disengage.
Link cautiously touched the screen in the place he felt Fi was indicating, finding that it responded to his finger in a similar way to the Beetle, at least in that another unreadable message appeared on the screen.
Touch the leftmost box.
Link did so, and a dull clunk rolled through the floor beneath his feet, the vertical line of four rectangles on the left-hand side of the screen changing to just two.
"Was that it?"
It was, Fi confirmed. You must now select the correct destination. The levitrain is almost autonomous, and you do not need to remain at the controls once it is in motion.
"Okay. What do I touch to do that?"
Following Fi's directions, Link pressed a bewildering array of unreadable statements, selecting whatever options she instructed. By the time he'd succeeded, he was pretty sure he'd learnt the words for 'yes' and 'no' just by seeing them so often.
I estimate that we are ahead of Ghirahim by eight minutes. The probability that he is aware of how to operate the levitrains is below 10%, but is not zero. You must now engage the propulsion mechanisms, Master. There is a manual safety lock which cannot be bypassed. Open the small, square hatch to the right of the screen, and turn the knob within 90 degrees clockwise. Another confirmation dialogue will appear on the screen.
"Got it." Link did as he was told, feeling the constant prickling of tension between his shoulderblades. The knob turned easily, clicking firmly into place, and as Fi had predicted, another message appeared. Link pressed the 'Yes' option before she could prompt him, and a gentle hum filled the levitrain, followed closely by a jolt of motion, as if he were in a cart someone had just begun to push. Forgetting the screen for the moment, Link bent down, gripping the edge of the angled surface, to peer out of the low window as the levitrain accelerated out of the dimness of the building and into the light of the desert day.
I am still alive, I promise! Things are just really busy right now. I make no current promises about regularity, but I have not given up on the story, nor am I going to!