A/N
Just so you guys know, this is supposed to be a different generation of Link and Zelda, it is not based off any particular Zelda game, but will likely reference several.
Onwards!
Oh. Here again.
Zelda floated in an oblivion of nothingness. She turned her head, looking for something to see, to get a grasp of position, motion, and a multitude of other things. There was nothing to see though. Just the darkness all around her, pushing, reaching, grasping at her. Zelda suddenly felt very claustrophobic.
And she hadn't even started.
Zelda felt -no, sensed – something whip past her, imaginary wind brushing her face. She whipped her head around to find it. Friend or foe, it would be something to get a grasp on in this void. She knew it was here with her, but she couldn't see it, not yet. She would see it soon.
Just not yet.
Zelda heard a deep mirthless laugh, felt hot breath on her neck. She turned herself around, or tried to; it was hard to know where she was facing in this abyss. Once again, she saw nothing.
Well, this is new.
It wasn't there. Nothing was.
Which was almost as terrifying as when there was.
Zelda looked around frantically, ignoring the crawling feeling of being reached for. She had to find it. She had to. Goddesses knew what would happen now, it wasn't there it wasn't there it wasn't there!
She sensed something huge flying around her in the darkness. She couldn't see it and it was driving her mad! The imaginary wind was building to an insane climax, whipping her hair into her face, making her wish she'd braided it. Pulling the hair out of her eyes as best she could, Zelda strained her eyes, looking into nothing.
It was there.
No it wasn't.
It something else.
It was big. It was huge. It was bigger than Death Mountain and the Hylian Ridge put together. It was absolutely massive.
It looked at her.
Zelda stared in hardly contain fear and awe at the beast, who's eyes glowed redder than the sunset, and who's body seemed to be darker than the void she was in. It was so dark that she couldn't make out what it really was. And she was afraid, she was so uncontrollably afraid.
"I'm coming…"
It spoke with such malice that Zelda almost broke down crying right there. It was so enormous, so unstoppable…
It was pure evil.
Zelda sat up suddenly, scarcely containing her screams for mercy. She stopped herself, not wanting her parents to come running, much less Impa. Impa was so over sensitive to anything Zelda did, sometimes she thought she'd suffocate. She looked around her room, checking everything. Her royal garb was still lying over the back of her chair, almost thoughtlessly dropped there. The curtains were shut tight. Same with the closet. Her light was still flickering away; she must have been so tired she forgot to put it out. Her sheets were tangled around her legs; normal after the nightmares.
Zelda sighed and put her head in her hands, before jerking back at the pinch of the gem on her headdress. She sighed again. Yes, she was very tired, she hated the headdress more than most things. She undid the clip in the back and took it off, placing it on the nightstand beside her, even though she probably wouldn't get to sleep again until it was time to get up and put it back on. She put her head in her hands again, letting her hair fall around her, unhindered by the headdress.
The nightmare had been different this time. Usually she would turn around and be so shocked at the giant thing in front of her that she woke up. This time, though, she saw it. And it told her it was coming…
Zelda threw the sheets off her legs and slid out of bed. She rushed to the window and almost ripped the curtains wide open before she remembered her state of dress. She settled for poking her head out of the curtains.
Nothing. No monster was coming. The day was just starting up for Hyrule; a few farmers were up early, starting their harvest. It was full swing in the harvest season, and tons of workers were out there harvesting. Good for them.
Zelda flopped back on her bed after checking that the curtains were closed tightly. She picked up the book on her nightstand. The History of Hyrule. Bleh. She threw it across the room, allowing a satisfied smile as it hit the floor with a muffled thump. She hated the royal training as soon as it started. It started when she was ten, and she was, she was fourteen now. Four years of it. She hated being cooped up in a room with a tutor for the better part of the day. It was boring as wherever people go when they die. She much preferred the self-defence lessons that Impa gave her, even if she was overprotective.
She began tracing imaginary lines on her arms and the blanket that she had untangled and pulled up over her again. She ended up drawing triangles mostly. She didn't know why, and she was to tired to think straight right now. It wasn't long before she fell asleep again, the light still burning.
Link let the hammer in his hand fall on to the heated lump of metal that he was slowly shaping into a sword. It hit with a loud clang and a couple of sparks joined the noise before falling down to the ground and slowly going out. He did this a few more times before taking it over to the oven and reheating it with the tongs.
He looked out over the rest of the people sweating over their work in the shop, wiping a bead of his own sweat away from his eye. Not that there was really much to look out over; the shop was only about ten meters from entrance wall to the back wall where he was standing by the oven, and about twice that in the other direction. But to Link, this was pretty much home, as he spent more time here than at his house closer to the edge of Hyrule. It was his way of making a living, and he enjoyed it.
He would have enjoyed it more if the imposing war would allow for more time to sleep. But, that was just him.
He pulled the metal out of the oven and brought it back over to his worktable. The hammer made several more clangs, adding to the cacophony that was this metal shop, before Link stepped back to look at the emerging sword.
"Hey!"
Link looked up at the fairy who was looking at his sword's drawings thoughtfully. He had almost forgotten about Navi, she had been rather quiet today. "What's up?" he asked, looking at the area of the drawing that Navi was drawing his attention to.
"Shouldn't this branch be more curved like this?" she asked, dragging her finger - and subsequently her entire body – across the sword drawing but slightly above the given curve of the sword, which looked like a double helix.
Link almost grinned; Navi wasn't really one for swords, and yet here she was asking questions about them. "Not really, because if it did, then it wouldn't be very structurally strong, and would end up being more of a club, where you would use the flat edge of it." he explained, pointing at the drawing as he spoke and trying very hard not to start gesturing and making a fool of himself.
"Oh," the fairy said quietly, her glowing brightening the slightest bit. After a couple seconds, she added, "This is a really strange weapon."
"I agree," Link nodded. It was among the stranger swords he'd been asked to forge. It wasn't exactly the best design for fighting. He thought it might just be an ornamental sword, to be hung somewhere in the castle. He was fine with that. It was just another sword made in the shop. He really needed to be making swords for the war, so he'd be happy to get this done.
A couple hours later, the lunch bell – which had been forged particularly large and loud, considering the circumstances – rang. Along with the rest of the metal workers, Link pulled a small wooden box out of under the table he was working at. He followed everyone as they walked out to the edge of the shop, where they all sat down to eat. Link, however, kept walking and turned left on the road – away from the castle – and walked towards the outskirts of the city, Navi flitting along behind him.
Eventually they reached a small hill with a rather large tree on it. It overlooked a large field of lush, green grass, with one or two butterflies fluttering around, sipping the nectar from the odd flower, staying longer at the Silent Princess patch that the princess planted when she was younger. Link sat with his back to the tree, looking out over the field. He set the box beside him and pulled a sandwich out of it. Navi landed on his head, and he thought he felt her start fiddling with his hair.
They sat like that for a while, talking lightly about several things, enjoying the beautiful weather, and – for Link at least – the food. He had finished the lunch he had brought, and was wondering what the slight noise he could here from the city was when Navi suddenly stopped talking and sat very still.
"What is it?" Link inquired.
Navi didn't respond for a while, but just sat there, her wings twitching slightly. Then she finally spoke. "I thought I heard the princess saying something, but directly into my head. It was weird."
Link sat and thought about this for a second before asking what she said, completely out of curiosity; he was pretty sure no Hylian was telepathic.
"She sounded kind of panicked, she said: 'To anyone who can hear this, please help! I'm in the castle in my room, I'm stuck, there's a fire, and I, I… please, somebody help!' Then she was cut off by something, I'm not sure what she said after."
Navi had to grab Link's hair tightly, as he suddenly jumped up and turned around to look at the city. Sure enough, they could see that there was a cloud of smoke ascending from below Hyrule Castle's tower. A rather large cloud of smoke.
No one would realise that there was someone stuck in a room in there.
No one else had a fairy that could pick up apparent telepathic messages.
No one else would know.
No one else would save her.
Navi held on tighter as Link grabbed his box and started running.
Link threw his lunch box into the metal working shop, vaguely noticing a disapproving look from his boss. It wasn't the first time he'd been late back from lunch. It was however the first time he had kept running past the shop. In the back of his head, he was glad he couldn't see his boss's look right now; he'd probably stop him and make him explain, losing Link precious time.
When Link got to the castle, he finally realized the magnitude of the fire. It had almost engulfed the entire castle. This couldn't have happened by accident. There was almost the entire Royal Guard present, throwing buckets of water on the fire.
"We can't go in there, we'll burn to death!" Navi stated, Link nodding in agreement, looking around for something else. He saw a curtain fluttering in the wind through a broken window. Running up to it, brushing past several confused guards, he ripped it off the curtain rod. He continued to look around, explaining to Navi.
"Heat creates an updraft. With the amount of heat in this fire, I should able to float, if I can get to somewhere above the fire." Navi understood and began looking around as well.
"Hey, what about the awning in front of the door? It should be thin enough to let heat through." Link agreed, and shoved his way past the amassing guards, who were probably trying to remove him from the scene now. Running up to the awning, he almost stopped as the heat hit him in waves. It was intense, hotter than even the oven in the shop. It was definitely started with magic, no fire could be this hot naturally. However, it did create an even better heat base.
Handing the curtain to Navi, Link stuck his boots and fingers into crevices in the stone wall of the castle, and then scrambled up it to get away from the pursuing guards. Hopefully they wouldn't start shooting at him on his float up. That would be… problematic at best. Beginning to sweat, Link pulled himself on to the awning.
"Navi, I need you to fly up there and find which room is the princess's, then come back and let me know." The fairy probably nodded; Link couldn't see through her bright blue glow. Nevertheless, Navi shot upwards in search of the princess's room.
Link busied himself first with testing the curtain. He held it above his head experimentally. To his surprise, he flew upwards a couple of feet immediately. He quickly pulled the curtain down, not wanting to get too high. He then started kicking the guards who tried to climb up onto the awning back down. It was only about a two meter drop, their armor would save them.
Navi came back finally. "Her room is straight up and a little to the right. Her presence is stronger there." Link nodded, kicked one more guard off and jumped off the right edge of the awning, spreading the curtain. He begged the goddesses that this would work.
Link began to ascend.
After not feeling the ground hit his feet for a while, Link slowly opened his eyes. He first saw Navi bouncing up and down ecstatically. "You did it! You're flying, Link!" she chirruped. Link then decided foolishly to look down.
Yes, yes he was flying.
Before he realized what he was doing, Link let go of one end of the curtain, and started to fall. He started to panic even more than he already was, as is normal for someone falling a hundred feet into flames. Navi, realizing what was happening, dashed down and grabbed the unattended end of the curtain, and attempted to hold Link aloft with her own strength. She only managed to slow his fall. However, with the end now within reach, Link grabbed as hard as he could, and managed to start ascending again.
Navi dropped down to sit on Link's shoulder, obviously out of breath. "Don't look down again, alright?" she huffed. Link didn't respond, but Navi knew him well enough to know he agreed.
After a few minutes of flying, Navi hopped off Link again and floated a couple windows up. "This is her room," she called back down to Link. "But the window is closed and locked."
"Not a problem." Link said, still sweating with the heat. Another thirty seconds later, he had floated to be level with the window. Then he kicked it in, to the absolute horror of Navi.
"Link! That's royal property! You can't just go around breaking it like you own it!" she yelped.
"In case you haven't noticed, the entire castle is burning down. This window would have been broken anyways." Link sighed as Navi turned her back and huffed. He swung himself a little, trying to get a little forward momentum, then gritted his teeth and let go of the curtain.
He just barely caught the window ledge.
Crawling in through the window, he felt the heat increase. Looking around, he saw that the bedroom was quite nice, but that was to be expected. It was Hyrule Castle. He also noticed that there was no one in the room.
"Where is she?" Navi sputtered, flying around the room faster than normal. "Maybe this isn't the right room…" However, Link showed Navi that it indeed was the right room, as Princess Zelda was written on the door in nice, cursive, Hyrulean letters.
Link walked back into the room to look for clues. Or attempted to. Instead he was punched across the room into the dresser, knocking several ornaments off the wall in the process.
A/N
Here we go.
Hey everyone! I finally wrote some more stuff! I started writing this because I actually got reviews from people I didn't know in person on my last fic, (You can read it here: /s/12547586/1/Stronger-Than-You) which was really encouraging! If you guys are reading this, thanks a lot. You really helped motivate me to write this.
Also, this chapter has 2,674 words, which make it the longest thing I've ever written! Yay! Wait, I'm back from editing. That number has increased! Double yay!
I'm kind of hoping to get a sort of schedule for this going if anyone likes it, so I hope to put about one a week out. But don't quote me on that.
See you all next chapter!
Credit goes to Alderion-Al from DeviantArt for the cover.