Chapter 14
It was late afternoon when Doctor Frederick entered the castle town from the path to Hyrule Castle. He was carrying a small sack across his back. He was quickly approached by a nearby guard.
"Doctor! Where have you been? A kid came to me asking about your whereabouts." The guard looked at Frederick's back and noticed the sack. "So, what's in the bag?"
Frederick frowned at the guard. He was awfully nosey for a guard. What did it matter what was in the sack? Frederick grumbled a reply to the guard.
"Oh, it's just some medical supplies I found. You said someone was looking for me? Of all the nerve! People should mind their own business around here instead of trying to follow me!"
The guard's eyes widened. He wasn't expecting an answer like that!
"Doctor, nobody is following you! A friend of your patient was looking for you! He said your patient needed your help!"
Doctor Frederick looked up at the guard in confusion.
"My patient? Errrr...Oh yes! The young boy! I have something for him! Sorry about that, sir! I've got to get to him right away!"
Doctor Frederick walked towards the back alleyways. The guard watched him go and as he did, he commented to himself about the doctor.
"I think it's almost time for old Frederick to retire! I think he's going senile!"
Doctor Frederick walked into his infirmary. He was confronted by an irritated Charlie.
"Doctor! Where have you been? Why did you leave my friend Link all alone?"
Frederick didn't reply. Instead he dropped the sack he was carrying Link sat up and began to lecture Frederick.
"Hey, Doc? My friend just asked you a question! Why did you leave me all alone? I could've been hurt by a gerudo or even killed by my former friend Max!"
The doctor was looking in the sack. He stopped looking inside and glared at Link.
"Watch your tongue, young man! Mind your manners! I am 86 years old! I forgot to tell you! I'm sorry, okay? Maybe it's time for me to hire an assistant! I can then train the assistant with all my knowledge of healing and if he or she is good enough, I may be able to retire! I'm getting too forgetful of late! Please forgive me, young man!"
Link sighed. He got himself all worked up over Frederick leaving and he never thought about how old Frederick was. Link decided to apologize to Frederick.
"Look, I'm sorry I lost my temper with you, but you got to try to focus on the safety of your patients! That wasn't the best idea leaving me alone like that! At the very least you should have asked a gurard to keep an eye on things while you were gone.
Doctor Frederick adjusted his glasses. "Yes yes you're right. I will keep that in mind with my future patients. In the meantime, what did you need, young man?"
Link tried to stand up out of his bed but he fell on the floor to his knees. He looked up at Doctor Frederick, his eyes squinting from the pain in his gut.
"Doc, I want to resume my journey! I don't want to be bedridden for weeks! I was going to ask you if I could walk around a little, but seeing how much a few steps hurt, I'm not going to bother."
Charlie and Doctor Frederick helped to lift Link back into his bed. Doctor Frederick grinned. This young man was eager to resume his journey. Wait until he saw what he had in the burlap bag! After Link was back in his bed, Frederick began to look at his wound.
"Okay, young man! I'm going to take these bandages off and see how your wound is doing! Please try to hold still!"
Doctor Frederick removed the bandages carefully to reveal a partially healed chest wound. He frowned with frustration.
"Hmm! If I keep you here and keep treating this wound normally, it will take at least a week to fully heal! Maybe longer!"
Link sat upright quickly.
"A week?! I can't stay in bed that long! Isn't there anything you can do to speed up the healing?"
Doctor Frederick smiled at Link.
"If the Great Fairy was right, this should heal you in a matter of minutes!"
Frederick walked over to the burlap bag and pulled out a small bottle with a white glowing light inside. Link looked closer and it looked like a big white glowing ball of energy. Link looked at Doctor Frederick in amazement.
"Doc, what is that thing? Why is it glowing?"
Doctor Frederick brought it over in front of Link.
"This, my boy is a Fairy's Spirit. They are supposed to glow like this. I got it from the Great Fairy outside the castle grounds. She told me to open the bottle in front of a badly injured human and the spirit would heal all wounds in a matter of minutes! Do you want to try it?"
Link sighed. Anything was better than sitting here for a week! He nodded.
"Yes. I'll give it a try!"
Frederick opened the bottle and the spirit floated out. It started to float right towards Link's wound. Suddenly, it went right into Link's wound! Link gasped with shock.. His wound suddenly felt warm and itchy. Link, Charlie and Doctor Frederick watched in amazement as the wound started to quickly heal. After about two or three minutes, the wound was completely gone. All three couldn't believe their eyes. One minute the wound was there and the next minute, it was healed over completely. Link stood up out of his bed and there was no pain in his gut at all! Link smiled joyfully.
"At last! I can move again! Thank you so much, Doc! If it wasn't for you, I would still be in that bed groaning! Sorry about getting angry before!"
Frederick smiled. "Don't mention it, young man! Just try not to get badly injured again okay?"
Link smiled. He felt so happy to be on his feet after the fight with Max. He waved at Frederick as he and Charlie walked away.
"Charlie, I need you to find Navi! We are continuing our journey!"
Charlie gave Link a puzzled look.
"I haven't seen her around, Link. After she talked to me about being too nervous to talk to you, she flew off somewhere."
Link frowned. Where did she go this time? She came in and apologized to him for deserting and now she was gone again! Suddenly, Navi flew towards Link with another yellow fairy. Navi cleared her throat.
"Link, Charlie, this is Valerie. She is Saria's fairy partner."
Valerie looked at Link and explained to him what was going on.
"I have come to deliver a message to you from Saria. She wants to see you again. I don't know what to do about Mido, but Saria told me to find you. I got lost in the big field outside of the forest until I found an oddly dressed man running in an easterly direction. I followed him from a distance and I saw a big gatehouse and a drawbridge. I flew over closer to the drawbridge and that's where I saw Navi. She told me that she was your fairy partner and here I am!"
Link smiled. He was glad Saria missed him. He missed her as well. He would go and see Saria before he made his way up Death Mountain. Link turned to Charlie and Navi.
"Okay, guys! Let's go back to the forest! If that jerk Mido gets in my way, I'm going to leave him with either a black eye or a fat lip!"
The zora guards were standing around the entrance to their home with their tridents pointed out. Suddenly, the zora guards heard someone laughing evilly. The unknown intruder then stopped laughing and commented to somebody else.
"Isn't this funny, Max? They are trying to block the way with a waterfall! Let's show them just how useless it really is against my power!"
Suddenly, the zoras heard a strange noise and the waterfall stopped flowing! The five zoras went closer to the entrance to investigate when a big purple blast of magic struck all five of them in the chest and sent them flying back. They all landed in the water below the entrance. All five were stunned.
Ganondorf and Max walked in the zora's home. Ganondorf sniffed the air in disgust. It really smelled bad in here! It reminded him of the smell of rotten fish. Ganondorf and Max followed the trail until they found a small flight of stairs. When they reached the top of the stairs, they came face to face with the zora king. He looked at Ganondorf and Max in horror.
"You! You are responsible for all the commotion I heard! What do you want from us?"
Ganondorf grinned.
"Listen carefully you fat fool! I want your Spiritual Stone! If you don't give it to me, I will do the same thing to you that I did to that octopus!"
""W-what did you do to an octopus?", asked King Zora.
Ganondorf answered by holding his hand out. It started to glow white. He then sent a bolt of lightning flying into the wall beside King Zora's throne. Ganondorf started to laugh.
"I shot one of those at it and I reduced it to a black shriveled up ball. The same thing will happen to your people if you refuse to give me that stone!"
The zora king panicked.
"B-but I don't have it! Please leave us alone! We are a peaceful race!"
Ganondorf glared at the zora king angrily.
"There won't be anything left of your race if you don't listen to me!"
Max stood forward.
"Maybe I can help convince this old fool!"
Max held out his hand and concentrated. A fireball shot out of his hand and hit the wall right above King Zora's head. Max then repeated his father's terms.
"The stone you fool! Where is the stone? Give it to us and we might let you live!"
King Zora had no choice. He decided to tell them.
"Okay! Okay! My daughter is wearing it! She is feeding our guardian god Lod Jabu Jabu. The entrance is behind me!"
Ganondorf smiled. Thanks to Max, he finally cracked under the pressure.
"Well done, son! Out of our way, fool!"
Ganondorf held out his hand towards the zora king and sent him flying from his throne. He landed on the floor beside the throne in shallow water. Ganondorf and Max then went in the entrance.
Pricess Ruto was feeding Lord Jabu Jabu a fish. He was a gigantic whale with a crown on top of his head. He had unusual blue eyes and his skin was grey in color. Suddenly, Ganondorf and Max came walking in. Princess Ruto faced them and addressed them.
"You two! What do you think you're doing? You aren't supposed to be in here! This is a restricted area!"
Ganondorf just grinned at her.
"You are King Zora's daughter I presume?"
Princess Ruto looked at him strangly.
"Yes that's right. Who are you?"
Ganondorf smiled.
"I thought you'd never ask! My name is Ganondorf and this is my son Max and we have come for the Spiritual Stone! Hand it over or else!"
Princess Ruto gasped in alarm.
"No! You can't have it! I'm supposed to give it to the man I choose to be my husband!"
Ganondorf laughed. Who would want to marry a weird fish girl?
"I'm sorry, little fish girl. I don't want to marry you. But I do want that stone! Hand it over now!"
Before Princess Ruto could say another word, Lord Jabu Jabu opened his mouth and sucked Princess Ruto into his belly! Ganondorf cursed angrily
"Curses! Now what am I going to do? She was wearing the blasted thing!" Ganondorf looked at Lord Jabu Jabu angrily.
"You stupid fish! This is all your fault! I am going to lay a curse on you! This curse will eat at you from the inside until all that's left of you are your bones! I will then come back for the stone!"
Ganondorf held out his hand and struck Jabu Jabu with a green blast of magic. The whale made a grunting noise.. Ganondorf sneered.
"Oh I see that hurt! Good! But I'm afraid it will only get worse as time goes by! Have fun, you stupid fish!"
Ganondorf walked away from Jabu Jabu and he and Max went back into the zora's home.
King Zora was walking back up to his throne when Ganondorf and max came running out of Jabu Jabu's area. He shouted at Ganondorf.
"What have you done to my daughter, you fiend?"
Ganondorf laughed loudly.
"Oh nothing. Your stupid guardian god ate her!"
King Zora went to his knees and started crying.
"Oh my dear sweet Ruto! I'm so sorry!"
Ganondorf and Max started laughing together and they disappeared in a cloud of smoke. King Zora sighed with relief. He put on an act for Ganondorf and Max. He assumed that ruto was fine because she always went inside Lord Jabu Jabu to clean his teeth and make sure nothing was wrong with him. Suddenly, the five guards that Ganondorf sent flying came walking up slowly and groaning. King Zora addressed them.
"People, don't be ashamed because you lost to that stranger! He had strange magical powers! So did his son! I want all of you to take a rest and recover from your injuries!"
The five zoras all had minor burns from the magic blast. Nothing serious. It would heal eventually.
Darunia and the rest of the gorons were exhausted. They picked away at the rock with little success. The bomb flowers weren't quite ripe yet either so the explosion from the fruit wasn't large enough to do anything. Altogether, the gorons chipped away four small piles of rock. They were then added to the food supply. Darunia and the rest of the gorons were back in their home with the rock piles. He was thinking about Argus and the quest he had taken on. He had always been one of the more stronger and headstrong gorons of his tribe and he trusted him to find the help they needed before it was too late. Darunia addressed his people.
"Okay, brothers! I'm not going to lie to you! We don't have much food left at all! We have to be careful! If we don't figure out a way to break that boulder soon, we may not last much longer! Let us not think of the bad news. Let us think of Argus and his quest to find some help!"
The gorons all grunted in agreement. Everyone was feeling weak from hunger. The small piles of rock had to be rationed carefully. Darunia sighed sadly. He hoped Argus was on his way back with help. Thanks to that evil man, they surely needed it! What was going to happen to the gorons if Argus failed in his mission? Darunia dismissed it from his mind and sat down on the hard floor and sighed weakly.
"Please succeed in your mission, Argus. Our lives depend on it.", said Darunia weakly to himself.
End of Chapter