Chapter Text
The stage was set. The players were in position.
Well, two players were. The rest of the office did not yet know they were players.
Zelda and Ganondorf returned the power cords to her people's computers, and it became a waiting game. All that remained was for the king to be placed in the board.
Zelda grinned to herself and checked the clock. Only another hour until her crew would start filing in, and set the plan in motion.
There was little that could go wrong.
She repeated that to herself enough times to where she almost believed it.
Ganondorf sneezed in the closet, startling her out of her thoughts.
Paya came in early, and spent time getting herself set up for the day.
Malon was not long behind her, and was playing with Tri as she waited for her coffee to cool. The litter box they'd hidden out of direct sight was tended the night prior, and she always had a little container of food and a bowl and water bottle, so setting up for the office cat was always a minimal effort.
The only trouble was, Tri liked to copy what everyone did, and spent his mornings in the chair across from Zelda. Some mornings, she would give him a little check in interview like he was anyone else on the crew. He would meow back, and thus earn a treat. This is where she found Tri after Malon turned to her work, and Link had not yet dragged himself in.
This morning's interview was not a productive as some as Tri curled up and fell asleep on the chair. She managed to send a message off to her father to come to the review floor.
"Behold!" Groose said as he wheeled a mostly metal and plastic contraption into the office. "The Spruce Groose!"
"That's not made of spruce," Impa replied without looking up.
"You can tell from the sound?" Malon asked in awe.
"No. The last three things he brought in made of wood all caught fire as he wheeled them off the elevator," Impa replied as she made a quick note. "I don't smell fire, and the sprinklers haven't gone off."
"So what is it?" Paya asked.
"It's a Reader Device," Groose announced. Link shrugged and continued trying to teach Malon's cat Tri how to shake hands. "Since we are trying to beat a time crunch, it seemed a good time to finish this little guy."
"That little guy probably hit the elevator weight limit," Zelda observed as she took a sip of her ice coffee and leaned against the doorframe of her office. "Speaking of elevators…"
Zelda glanced at Malon, who shrugged helplessly. Seems she wasn't able to pull off a miracle. The morning was not yet lost, though.
"You speak poorly of it now, but wait. I will be able to put anything into this and get a well-written review out of it," Groose groused. "Here, plug that in."
Malon did not plug the machine in. Paya pulled out a nail file. Groose sighed and plugged the machine in.
"Without further ado!" Groose grinned widely.
"For now," Skull Kid added.
"Shush," Groose replied and hit the power button.
A loud pop preceded the lights going out as Link cried out. Skittering and claws digging into the low pile carpet informed the room that Tri did not approve and probably drew blood as she ran.
"I think we found some ado," Malon said into the darkness.
A flashlight clicked on at Impa's desk, and she was dutifully back to reading and taking notes.
"Good show. I'll take that to mean we are still the ones reading." Zelda shook her head and sipped her coffee.
"I tested this at home." Groose groaned. "That shouldn't have happened."
"At least this didn't try to catapult Link through the floor," Skull Kid laughed. "Unless that's still an option?"
"You will not be defenestrating anyone through or out of the building," Zelda said. "Link, are you both okay and able to get the breaker?"
"I can reach it," Groose replied sullenly.
"You've done quite a bit to help already," Zelda stated dryly.
Link gave a wordless noise of assent. Zelda could just start making out his outline as he began moving to the far corner of the office.
"Watch eyes," Zelda warned as she closed her eyes.
Her eyelids shone a warm grey as the light came back on. With all the computers still off, Groose's machine whirred to life as the competing draw was no longer an issue.
"Ha! Success!" Groose cheered.
"I mean. It's on," Malon stated skeptically. "I wouldn't say it's working as yet."
Paya's phone started buzzing on her desk, and she looked white as she looked down at it.
"Well, let's just see about that," Groose said as he took a step and pulled the manuscript print out of Impa's hand.
She seized his empty one as he turned away and Groose yelped in pain as he set the pages on the machine's feed tray. The next actions happened too fast for Impa to do anything else.
The machine ingested the packet. The large device thunked and thumped. Something whistled not unlike a tea kettle. Zelda could swear there was a chainsaw running at some point. The lights in the room flickered but stayed on as Link approached the device cautiously.
The Reader made a couple final clangs and the whir of printer rollers joined the cacophony. A single page printed out, and a puff of smoke was expelled into Link's face. He yelled as he fell back from the machine.
Malon was the first to react and rushed to the downed trainer-of-cats.
"Where. Is. The. Manuscript." Impa gritted her teeth and stood to grab Groose's ear. "Get it out of there."
"Hey - ow! - it'll be right out. Just give it a second. Let go of me!" Groose begged.
"Manuscript first," Impa said implacably.
Zelda shook her head and approached the machine. She pulled the paper off the tray and glanced at it.
"Hey Groose? What did you use to make this thing work?" Zelda frowned.
The paper was covered in bits of magazine letters cut out and glued to it not fully dissimilar to a ransom note.
"Ow! Why?" Zelda showed him the paper. "Oh, those little shits! Let go I need to tend this!"
"What 'this', Groose," Zelda said sweetly.
"The - ah - internal mechanisms are misaligned," Groose said with a manic look to his grin. "Hey Impa, you may need to print another copy of that work."
"There isn't another copy," Impa growled. "That was mailed in."
The machine whirred to life and a new page spit out. Zelda picked it up and showed the printout reading 'LIES' to Groose.
"Are you sure you're being honest with me?" Zelda batted her eye lashes. She saw his resolve crumbling quickly. In the background, a phone buzzed loudly against a desk, and Paya cursed and said someone was coming.
"The. The - ah…"
"Mechanism?" Zelda supplied.
"Yes. Mechanism -" Groose took a deep breath. "Is Picori."
Zelda crumpled the paper up and threw it at his face.
"Why would you think that's a good idea?!" Zelda demanded to know.
"Link's out good this time," Malon reported as Skull Kid found an access panel on the machine that was less secured than one might hope.
"Manuscript," Impa demanded again.
"It feeds out the end," Groose said with a gesture.
"That's a pile of shredded paper," Skull Kid said helpfully while picking up the pile and tossing it like confetti.
"Groose," Zelda growled. "Did your Picori-driven device destroy the only copy of a work we had?"
"The one that you slipped into my pile thinking I wouldn't notice?" Impa growled.
"Oh - oh! Th-that one…" Groose grinned nervously. "That uhhhh. That's not ideal."
"Zelda! My daughter!" Zelda's father was many things. Subtle was generally not high on the list of it made the cut at all. He entered the review office as he entered any space - knowing that his was the only presence that mattered, and being as insufferable about the fact as he could be. "How goes our wonderful little project?"
"Daughter?" Paya asked as she narrowed her eyes at Zelda.
"Unfortunately." Zelda sighed and set her frozen insulated mug aside. "Father! How are you!"
"Link? Wake up, Link," Malon said as she leaned over him to listen for a breath. A moment later, she shrieked and sat bolt upright while holding her ear. Link grinned and wiped his mouth. "You jerk!"
Link gave her a thumbs up. Groose gave a howl of pain as Impa got him in a headlock and was forcing him to the floor.
Zelda's eye twitched as her father stepped into the room with a look of absolute control and confidence despite the unraveling chaos.
The Reader started smoking. A closet door opened, and a pink crystal formed around her father as Ganondorf stepped out of the tiny space. Flames leapt into the air over the reader, and Skull Kid backed away with a frightened howl.
Which is, of course, when the fire sprinklers kicked on, dousing everything and shorting out power in the room. Again. Everyone screamed in shock and offense and being in the cold, wet darkness.
Zelda reached out a shaking hand for her coffee trying to suppress her rage with delicious caffeinated goodness. She found it with the back of her hand, and heard it crash to the floor. She cursed and felt the water from the sprinklers become a sheet of ice around her feet.
"What the blazes is going on here!" Her father pounded on the crystal enclosure.
"My years-long revenge," Ganondorf laughed darkly. "I am finally doing this thing."
"You really are doing things," Zelda felt the edge of manic desperation the need for control started to seize her.
"Sometimes you just gotta be doin' things," the large occasional villain shrugged.
He probably also took a step forward. There was definitely the sound of slipping and scrambling and his deep bass cussing in protest.
And then a solid thunk. Zelda sighed as the water spraying around the room began to soak through her clothing and make it stick to her. The solid scraping, sliding, groaning sound was inevitable. The floor was wet, and then frozen. And now -
On queue, glass shattered across the room as the Spruce Groose launched itself out the window and careened to the sidewalk below. Sunlight flooded the scene.
Link was coated in ice. Malon was bracing herself on her desk for support as water soaked her as well. Paya was burying her face in her hands and sobbing. Impa had let Groose fall into a heap on the floor as she slid across the room to look down at her poor destroyed story among the wreckage of the machine. Ganondorf was ass-over-teakettle in the middle of the floor where once the Reader had been - he was already drenched, and his white shirt left nothing to be imagined. She couldn't see Skull Kid anywhere.
The only person not molested in all of this was her father, caught in Ganondorf's little trap crystal.
"Zelda! What chaos have you been engaging in down here?" her father demanded. She held a hand up to him.
"I'll have to think of a line," she replied as she took slow, deep breaths to calm herself. "Groose, get up and figure out why the fire alarm didn't come on."
"Ow," he replied pitifully.
"That did not go as planned. Where was I?" Ganondorf grumbled as he unfolded himself and stood. He turned toward her father and put his hands on his hips as he inclined his chin. "Oh yes. Revenge. For thatday seven years ago."
"What the hellfires are you talking about?" her father demanded.
"When you banished me for my illicit desires," Ganondorf clarified.
"Wha - you mean when I told you I am not dating a kid? You were seventeen! It was entirely reasonable to turn you down!" Her father shook his head. "You've been holding a grudge for not dating you as a minor?"
"Uh. Yes."
Zelda couldn't help it anymore. The laughter was not cathartic or joyful. She crumpled in on herself as the sheer ridiculousness of everything finally overwhelmed her. At some point, the water stopped falling on her. She only barely registered Groose was holding an umbrella over her.
"Paya, can you please call Ganondorf back and tell him to stop trying to get me to call him dad?" Zelda put her head in her hands as she rested her elbows on her father's former desk. "And tell him to drag my father home from their little honeymoon so he can sign the company over like he promised. I cannot do anything without that signature."
Paya nodded and gave her a thumbs up. She was already dialing before turning back to her desk. Zelda could not have a more perfect secretary, and her wife was a wonderful replacement in her old department.
"And tell him I can't authorize replacing the broken glass, too. I still blame him for that."
"Yes, ma'am," Paya laughed. "Want me to tear into him for poor taste in men?"
"Only if it helps sell the bit," Zelda snickered. "Just make sure…"
"Don't worry, ma'am," Paya nodded. "Oh, hi, Gan… No I will not call you your full name until your husband signs his full name… yes this is also about the window. No, I will not accept an apology. He damn well better be by later today… yes I will threaten him if I must - oh hello Zelda's dad. I hope you are having a great time… your daughter was quite clear that she would have your house reposesssed if you don't… this afternoon? Perfect."
Zelda leaned back in her chair with a smile. Finally, she could get things done around here.
Probably.
She turned chair to look out the large window that didnt have blinds stuck closer and sighed contently.
She had heard they actually managed to hit six hundred during all the excitement, and broke it by a dozen.
Paya hung up the phone.
"Paya," Zelda called out.
"Ma'am?"
"Let's order a cake and see what supplies Skull Kid needs to make a mask."