Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

With every step Vanna took down the pristine halls of Ridertech, her sense of self-preservation screamed at her to turn around.

It was stupid. She was going to get caught, and everything would be ruined. Mr. Rider would be furious with her. She would be fired on the spot. Her reputation would be so stained that she would never be able to get another job ever again. Her whole future was on the line.

But for this once, she wasn't going to listen to the side of herself that imagined the worst.

She couldn't just let her mom keep suffering when the answer was right there.

As she made her way down the testing floor, she feigned confidence so she wouldn't arouse any suspicions. What were arguably the hardest parts were already done; she'd nabbed one of Mr. Rider's spare keycards without getting caught the last time she was at his house hanging out with Zi—his son and protégé, her best friend—and she'd snuck her way here without her mom catching her. Now, it was the same as every day she came to work. Besides the fact that she wasn't supposed to be working today, and besides the fact that she had no business going to Testing Room 47.

Finally, she made it to the hallway that the door to room 47 was situated at the very end of. Fear struck her as she noticed someone in the hall, but that quickly subsided when she realized who—or rather, what—it was. Synthia, Mr. Rider’s secretary.

Someone who didn’t know any better would have mistaken Synthia for a human. That was what Mr. Rider had spent the majority of his career trying to achieve, and he certainly had succeeded as far as appearances went. It was only when you took the time to pay attention to the behavior of Synthumans that it would become clear that the inside didn't match the outside. They were extremely meticulous with their work, focused on fulfilling whatever it was they were programmed to do, in a way that even the most hard-working humans could never live up to. You would never see a Synthuman get distracted and slack off. As Synthia passed her by without even sparing her a glance, Vanna felt extremely thankful that Mr. Rider had yet to create a sentient Synthuman.

Though she knew that Synthia would not look back at her, Vanna still double-checked to make sure she wasn’t doing so as she came to a stop in front of the metal door with 47 engraved on a plaque above it. If everything she'd heard was right, then this was the room where it was.

She raised Mr. Rider's keycard to the scanner, and it flashed green as the metal door zipped up into the wall. Through the open doorway, she could see it on a desk right smack in the middle of the room—a device in a glass encasement. She took a slow step inside, in awe that it was real. The door then closed so fast behind her that strands of her long hair blew forward, and that gust kicked her out of her admiration, reminding her that she had to hurry.

After using Mr. Rider's keycard again to gain access to the lock panel on the wall and disabling the teleport-blocking transmitter for the room, she walked over to the device. Its appearance was deceptively simple: a black armband with a green backlit screen and a virtual keyboard. It didn't look too different from her own TPort, which was one of the older models. She was more than a little underwhelmed by it, but she supposed it didn't really matter if it looked like some regular teleporter. It was what it did that set it apart. No other device in the world had the same functionality.

NEVA. She wasn't sure if the letters stood for anything, or if it was even finalized as that, but that was apparently what it was being called. She doubted anyone would even bother with saying its name, though, when they could just call it what it really was—the world's first time-traveling device.

At first, she'd been hesitant to believe the rumors about it floating around Ridertech. 'Mr. Rider is working with the government to create a time-traveling device' sounded like nothing more than a conspiracy theory. It wasn't that she didn't believe that Mr. Rider was capable of making a time-traveling device, per se. He was renowned around the world for his Synthumans and TPorts, the best robots and teleportation devices on the market, and being a family friend meant that she'd gotten to witness his genius firsthand. Her faith in him and his abilities was absolute—but she had little faith in the sources of the rumors. She'd thought it was just others like her, entry-level beta testers, dreaming about getting to test out something fun and fully revolutionary instead of just searching for bugs in some new minor update to the teleporters and robots everyone was already familiar with.

But when her source changed, so too did her belief. During what would otherwise have been an entirely forgettable conversation between herself and her friends, she'd made some joke about the rumor, and Zi had slipped up and all but outright confirmed it. He'd clamped his mouth shut after the words were out, a clear indicator that he knew he'd messed up, but it seemed that Vanna was the only one who had noticed his mistake; none of their friends had reacted as they should have to the confirmation that there was a genuine time-traveling device. They'd started talking about mundane rumors they'd heard going around in their own workplaces, and Zi had visibly relaxed, and Vanna could think of nothing but how she could use it.

Then, to her surprise, Mr. Rider himself had confirmed it as well. She had been asking around to find out as much as possible, and she'd caved and decided to ask him about it directly. He'd hesitated, at first, before saying he trusted her enough. He'd told her that he'd been working on it since long before she was even created—she'd scrunched up her nose at his phrasing, and he'd quickly corrected himself by saying 'born'; the man really needed more of a life outside of his inventions—and that it should finally be completed by the end of the year. Most importantly, though, he'd told her that it was funded by and created for the government, so it was never going to be available for public use. As soon as it was finished, it would be taken in by authorities, and one of his life's greatest achievements would be out of his hands. She knew then that she had to work fast, before she missed her chance—her chance to go back in time and stop her dad from getting into the accident that had taken his life and desolated their family.

And now, after weeks of snooping and planning, she was here. Her one glimmer of hope was staring her right in the face—and so was the paper next to it with a host of warnings about how dangerous it could potentially be. It was clear that even the people who knew the most about time-travel were still unsure of its potential consequences.

As much as she'd been trying to push her negative thoughts away, the warnings made her fears come out in full force. Awful scenario after awful scenario played out in her mind. She would go back to that day, stop her dad from leaving, then come back to this time to find that she had merely created a new, unreachable branch of time, and nothing at all had changed here—or she would go back to that day, stop her dad from leaving, and then she would poof out of existence because she came from a time that could no longer exist—or, worst of all, she would go back to that day, and her mere presence there would make the universe fold in on itself and everything would cease to exist. There were so many ways everything could go wrong.

It was hard to reroute her thoughts from those awful scenarios, but she did. She made herself envision the scenario that had brought her here in the first place: she would go back to that day and stop her dad from leaving, and when she would come back to this time, her family would be whole again. Happy again.

Memories rushed through her mind. Taking a joyride with her dad in a convertible car, him laughing as the wind whipped her hair in her face. Coming out of her room at night to find her parents snuggled up on the couch together, smiles on their faces at being together even in sleep. Her fourteenth birthday when they woke her up in her bed with a cake, both so full of love for her that they were nearly bursting at the seams with glee despite it hardly even being a milestone of a birthday. And further back, in her childhood...

'Stop it. Stop wasting time trying to reminisce,' she scolded herself. 'This is my only chance to do this. I have to do this. No more distractions—and no turning back now.'

Lifting the glass encasement, she reached in and grabbed NEVA and the paper next to it. She ignored all the warnings on the paper, her eyes only scanning it long enough to find the instructions she needed. After she found the command, she did her best to put NEVA on with shaking hands. Then, worried that NEVA might mess with it in some way, she took off the TPort on her left arm just in case.

Vanna closed her eyes—like you were supposed to before teleporting, as the sudden change in scenery was known to be migraine-inducing—and took a deep breath in, steeling herself for what she was about to say.

"NEVA, activate," she said. "Time-travel: 0800 hours, November 7th, 2117."

Crackling noises came from her wrist, prompting her to open her eyes and look down. Little sparks were coming out of NEVA, and she was still in the same room. She hurried to take it off, but before she could, the sparks started to fly wildly and a shock coursed through her body, rendering her unable to move. She couldn't even yell for help or open her eyes that had squeezed shut from the pain.

Suddenly, the electricity stopped coursing through her. Vanna fell to her knees, let out the breath she had been involuntarily holding in, and took NEVA off before it could have the chance to shock her again. She opened her teary eyes to inspect her burning arm.

If she hadn't already fallen to the ground, she would have just then.

Because she wasn't in Ridertech anymore.

Chapter Text

She was in a small clearing in the middle of a forest.

Cutting through the surrounding raised trees were two sunken lanes, one to her left and one straight ahead of her, and to her right was a gigantic tree that looked to have been fashioned into a house. She was bewildered, to say the least. Where the hell was she? Or, perhaps more importantly—when? She'd given NEVA no instruction to bring her to another place; if it hadn't brought her to a different location, then it certainly hadn't brought her to the right time. Ridertech had been in the same exact place three years ago, and the specific land it was built on probably hadn't resembled anything close to this in hundreds and hundreds of years.

Though she didn't have hope of her phone knowing when she was, since it wasn't like it would automatically know if she'd time-traveled, she had hope that it could at least answer the where part. While the date and time were still the same as when she'd left, as she'd expected, her location was not—only because it wasn't showing her being anywhere at all. The dot signifying her location on the map was surrounded by nothing but gray, and where it usually would've said where she was at the bottom, it merely said No Location Found. She'd never seen that before, ever. Even when she was literally in space.

Maybe, then, it had brought her back to the time she'd requested, but it had simply put her in a completely random place as a result of her not specifying where she wanted to go, and her phone couldn't pinpoint her location because it was looking for GPS signals from in her own time. It still wasn't an ideal scenario, but it was better than thinking she'd wound up in caveman times.

The only way to find out where and when she was, it seemed, was to find someone in the area to tell her.

She got off the ground and wiped the dirt off her legs, and decided to go see if someone was in the tree house first as it was closest to her. Leaving NEVA on the ground—she was not touching that thing for a while—Vanna climbed up the ladder to reach its door. Knocking on it, her heart raced in anticipation. That anticipation gradually faded away as thirty seconds passed with no sign of someone coming to the door. She knocked again, and after another thirty seconds passed, she decided to peek in.

Vanna opened the door as quietly as she could and poked her head in. Nobody was inside, so she let herself the rest of the way in, not fully closing the door behind her. It was a nice little tree house, but it looked so ... old-fashioned. There wasn't a single technological device to be seen. Thinking that the house had to be owned by some dirty old tree hugger, she decided to go down one of the lanes to see if anyone else was nearby.

Just as she got back to the door, it started to open wider. She gasped at the same time as the person who opened the door did.

"I'm not a robber, I swear!" Vanna immediately yelled, throwing her hands up. She realized as soon as the words were out that they were almost laughably untrue, considering that she was only here because she had just committed a robbery, but it was true nonetheless that she had no intentions of robbing this house.

He said nothing at first, simply staring her up and down, and Vanna took the time to do the same of him. Surprisingly, he didn't look like a dirty old tree hugger. His strange and slightly familiar green getup that included a sword on his back was old-fashioned in the extreme, but he appeared to be about her age. He had soft blue eyes and dirty blond hair that was almost light brown. She thought he was actually quite good-looking—ignoring the sad state of his height. The guy was hardly any taller than her, and she was already very short for a girl in the 2100s. She noticed, too, that he was holding NEVA in one of his gloved hands.

When she looked back up to his face, his cheeks were red.

"Who are you, and why are you in my house?" he finally asked.

"You're Southern...?" She had never been out of the Mid-Atlantic, and barely ever out of New Jersey, so she was taken aback by the thought of being so far from home. "Sorry, uh, my name's Vanna. I'm ... a traveler. And I got lost. I came in here to find someone to tell me where exactly I'm at, because I have no idea. I promise, I wasn't in here to rob you or anything like that. If you just tell me where I am, I'll be on my way."

"Ordon."

"Ordon?" she repeated. "I'm guessing it's someplace in the south, huh?"

He nodded. "Only village down here in Ordona Province."

Vanna was stunned for a second by his claim that they were in a province—what had happened to the states? Were they even in America at all?—but she was quickly distracted when she noticed the pointy ears he had on that were partially obscured by his hair, and it clicked why his outfit was familiar. "Is there a con going on nearby for ancient games or something?"

His eyebrows drew together. "A what?"

"Con? Convention...?" 'A place where I could find someone who could help me out? Someone normal, who doesn't live in a tree?' "You know, where people go and cosplay as characters, like the character you're cosplaying as right now."

His expression twisted from slightly bemused into full-blown baffled. "What? What in the world are you talkin' about?"

She mirrored his confused look. "You ... know you're cosplaying as Zelda, right? I mean, I'm not into super old games, but even I know Zelda when I see him."

"What's 'cosplaying'?"

What kind of person could make such a good cosplay and not even know there was a word for it? "I just mean that you're dressing up as Zelda."

He looked even more confused at that. "I ain't dressin' up as Zelda," he said, looking down at his clothes. "I was—"

"Link!" she suddenly exclaimed, making his head snap back up. "His name is Link, not Zelda. Zelda's the princess, right?"

No response—he just stared at her with wide eyes.

"...Uh, sorry for interrupting you," she said. "Wasn't trying to be rude, I was just ... excited that I remembered stuff from Zelda games, 'cause they're so old."

He stayed silent for a few more seconds before speaking. "I was gonna say I was given this outfit and told that it belonged to an ancient hero, but... What do you mean 'his name is Link'? What's 'Zelda games'?"

...Seriously?

She wondered if she should even bother to respond when he had to be playing dumb, but his face stayed dead serious, so she decided she would play along. "Link was the hero in the Zelda games, so whoever gave you that outfit was talking about him. They used to be really popular in the late 1900s and early 2000s."

The confusion drained from his face, being replaced by a show of concern. "Are... Are you okay? It's ... not the 2000s yet, or even the 1900s. The year is 1598."

Vanna's jaw dropped. "It's 1598?"

Once he nodded, she snatched NEVA out of his hands and looked at its screen. Sure enough, it said that the date was September 1st, 1598. Exactly 521 years back from the day she'd been in.

Surprised as she was, she realized it made sense for her to be back so far in time. It explained why the boy didn't know about cosplaying or video games or Zelda, and why his house was so old-fashioned and barren of technology.

But then, she realized, her explanation of someone giving him the Link outfit made no sense. Link wasn't an ancient hero in the 1500s. How would someone from this time have known about the hero of a video game hundreds of years before video games were invented?

"...Is that thing yours?" the boy asked, pulling Vanna out of her thoughts. "I found it on the ground outside."

"Yeah, it's mine, I left it there," she said. "Who gave you that costume?"

"I could ask the same of you," he said, quickly glancing down at her body.

She supposed it being the 1500s also explained why he had gotten all red when he saw that she was wearing a bodysuit and crop top. He had probably never seen a girl's legs before.

"I know my outfit is scandalous, whatever," she said. "Seriously, who gave you your clothes?"

"It ... wasn't exactly a person. It was a Light Spirit."

"A Light Spirit?"

"You really haven't heard of them?" he asked. "The Light Spirits each protect a province at the order of the Goddesses. The one who watches over Faron Province gave me this tunic."

Every word he said was just making Vanna more and more confused. "What Goddesses? I thought everyone here believed in Jesus in the 1500s."

"The Golden Goddesses...? Din, Nayru, Farore...? Y'know, the ones who created this green Earth and everythin' on it?"

It took her a second to realize what he meant, and when she did, she crossed her arms. "Right. Yeah, I've heard about the Golden Goddesses. I might've never liked history, but I do like games, and I know that people in 1598 didn't believe in the Golden Goddesses, because the Golden Goddesses weren't thought up until the late 1900s. You can't—you don't really think I believe that I'm actually in, what's it called, Hyrule?"

"Ordon's not really a part of it, so you're not actually in Hyrule, but—"

"But you really want me to believe that Hyrule is real?" she interjected.

He looked at her like she was out of her mind. "Why would you believe that Hyrule isn't real?"

"Because Hyrule isn't real!" she said. "This—oh, god dammit, I know what this is! Ugh! I should've known it was too good to be true! This is just some stupid VR game, isn't it?! That's what NEVA is!"

"What's—?"

"Shut up, Zelda," she said. She squeezed her eyes shut, attempting to hold back the tears of disappointment that were threatening to spill from them. "You're not real. You're a made-up character in a virtual reality game, and I'm not even actually talking to you right now."

"She's insane," whispered a high-pitched, echoing voice in a sing-song tone.

Vanna opened her bleary eyes, and nearly stumbled back when she saw a small shadowy creature floating in the air next to Link. The creature dove down to the ground quickly, merging with the boy's shadow.

"Sorry 'bout her," Link muttered.

"I'm not sorry," said the girl from where she still hid in his shadow. "Seriously, Link. Just leave. We have stuff to do, and Crazy here is only holding us back."

"She's not crazy. She's confused," he said to his shadow. He looked back up at her. "How did you get here?"

Vanna took in a deep breath and tried to blink away the wetness in her eyes. "I was trying to use NEVA—this bracelet. It was supposed to be a time-traveling device. I told it to take me from September 2119, where I was, to November 2117, and it freaked out and sparks started flying from it and when I opened my eyes, I was outside your house."

"So, it accidentally took you way further in the past than it was supposed to?" he said.

"This isn't the past, this is another world. One that's fake."

"How could this world possibly be fake?" he asked. "You've seen it with your own eyes."

"Because Hyrule isn't real!" she said in frustration. "Hyrule is a made-up, fictional place, and you are a made-up, fictional character. You don't exist in reality. This is all virtual. I'm standing in one of the rooms of the factory right now, but I'm here in my head, because of NEVA."

The shadow girl groaned and came out again. "So, let me get this straight—you think that that oversized bracelet is making you hallucinate that you're in a fake world?"

"Pretty much, yeah," Vanna said.

She held her small shadowy hands up in front of her chest, conjured a ball of what looked like orange electricity out of nowhere, and then flung it toward NEVA. NEVA was instantly reduced to nothing but ash, and it slipped through Vanna's fingers to the wooden floor.

"There," the shadow girl said. "If that was making you hallucinate, you wouldn't be here anymore. This world is real even if it might be fictional where you come from, and you really are here, so you can stop making up excuses because you don't wanna believe it."

Vanna looked down at the ashes at her feet. The tears she'd been trying to fight back welled up in full force and her heart started to beat wildly as her mind raced through the implications.

NEVA was a time-traveling device, just as the rumors had said, just as Mr. Rider himself had confirmed, just as the papers with it had reinforced—but it had malfunctioned, breaching worlds instead of time.

And now it was a pile of ash.

"Why did you do that?!" Vanna shouted. "That was my only way to get home! I'll be stuck here forever now!"

"...Oops?"

Chapter Text

"Oops? Oops?!" Vanna yelled. "You just—you ruined my life!"

"If I hadn't done it, you'd still be yapping on about how you're in a fake world," the shadow girl said with a shrug.

Vanna had half a mind to reach over and strangle her. "If you hadn't destroyed it, I could've just told it to take me back home and it would have, you piece of shit!"

"Midna, the least you could do is apologize..." Link gently said.

She crossed her arms. "I'm not apologizing. If she's stuck here forever, that's her own problem, not mine."

"You caused the problem!" Vanna yelled, feeling like she could pass out from fury.

Midna yawned. "You said that if Link told you where you were, you would be on your way. He told you you're in Ordon already, so..."

"That was before you decided to be an asshole and trap me here!"

"Is there anything you can do to bring it back?" Link asked Midna.

"It's thousands of ashes on the ground, now. I'm not as powerful as I—" Midna suddenly cut herself off, then shook her head and dove back down into Link’s shadow. "I'm not wasting any more of my power to bring back some worthless jewelry. So she's just gonna have to get used to this world, and she's gonna be getting used to it while we leave, like we were going to do before she interrupted everything."

"It's not some worthless jewelry, it's my only way to get home!" Vanna said, glaring at Link's shadow. "If your power can zap it to ashes, it can bring it back!"

"What did I just say? You're not getting your stupid bracelet back. Come on, Link. Let's get out of here."

Link sighed. "I'm really, really sorry for what she did and for how she's acting about it... But we have to go. You can go down to the village—just take the path right across from my house. The mayor's house is the very last one to the left. He's got himself holed up in there right now, but I'm sure he'd come out for someone who needs help."

Vanna was still fuming, but she tried her hardest to keep herself calm. Link didn't deserve to bear the brunt of her anger when he'd done nothing to her. "And what's down the path to the side?"

"If you go down it a bit, you'll get to the Spirit's Spring, but don't go any farther than that. It's not safe out there." He turned to his door and opened it, then looked back at her. "I doubt they'd turn you down, but if no one in the village will take you in while you figure things out, you can stay in my house. I'll probably be busy for some time. Won't be needing my house much."

He walked outside and Vanna followed after him, closing the door behind her. One after the other, they climbed down the ladder.

"You really trust me?" Vanna asked.

Link stared into her eyes for a few seconds. "Yeah."

She'd just told herself in her head that Link didn't deserve to be treated badly, but she already ran out of the willpower to not unleash her sour mood on him. "You should let me speak with your parents so I can tell them about how you're trusting a stranger you've known for all of five minutes to stay in your house. I bet they'd be really proud."

"They're dead," he said stiffly.

Vanna raised her eyebrows. "Oh... Sorry. I didn't know."

"It's fine. Goodbye."

With that, he walked away, down the path leading away from the village. Vanna wanted to yell after him and ask him why he was going down the dangerous path, and tell him that she really was sorry and that her dad was dead, too, so she knew how he felt, but thinking of her dad made her freeze up.

She had stolen NEVA to go back in time and stop him from dying—and now it wouldn't make a difference to her if he was dead, because even if he was alive, she would never get the chance to see him again. She was never going to see anybody from home ever again.

The reality of the situation hit her like a ton of bricks. Her lingering anger at Midna faded into anguish, the weight of it making her collapse to the ground. She drew her knees up and buried her head between them as the first tears finally slipped out of her eyes.

She would never again cry on her mother's shoulder, and never again feel the warm embrace of Zi. She would never get to see her oldest half-sister Kalina get married to Ami next May, and never get to meet her other half-sister Jaylene's son due to be born next month. She would never graduate high school, never climb up the ranks at Ridertech, never create new technology to revolutionize her world, never have her mom walk her down the aisle, never introduce her children to her family. Her life as she knew it was gone, and all her hope for the future was gone with it.

Her mind couldn't stop racing over what her family and friends would be thinking, feeling, doing. She wanted so badly to tell them that she was alive and well, not dead like they would most likely presume her to be. Her mom was going to be a wreck. She'd already lost so much in her life—first Kalina and Jaylene's dad had walked out on her, and then a freak spacebus accident had killed Vanna's dad, and now Vanna was gone, too—she was going to absolutely break. Her sisters would probably have to have their mom hospitalized. And if imagining her mom's reaction wasn't bad enough on its own, she imagined how her dog would wait endlessly for her to return home, but she never would—and he would never even know why. At least her family and friends had the capacity to understand.

And it was entirely her own fault. She'd broken her family even further, she'd lost everything and everyone she'd ever loved, and there was nobody to blame but herself.

The regret she felt was suffocating.

"You all right there, lass?"

Vanna quickly looked up at the sound of the voice. An older, potbellied man with a mustache that strangely looked like tusks was walking toward her. She wiped her eyes, but she couldn't make herself get back to her feet.

"What's got you down?" he asked.

She struggled to get the words out past her sobs. "I—I can't get home."

"Where're you from? I’m the mayor of this village here, and I know all ‘bout the lands around it. I could help you find a way home."

"No," she said, the word coming out like a whine. She buried her head between her knees again. "No, you can't. You have no idea..."

"Oh, I'm sure we can get you back home. Where’d you come from? Castle Town? Kakariko Village?"

"I'm not from Hyrule. I'm not from this world but I'm stuck here and there's no way to get back to mine," she snapped. As soon as she finished speaking, she realized she was much too harsh on the kind man who was only trying to help her.

He was silent for a few moments. "...Pray tell, how, exactly, did someone from another 'world' get here?"

"It doesn't matter. The thing I used to get here was destroyed, and it can't be brought back..."

...Unless—when Link had asked if Midna could bring back NEVA, she'd spoken like she would be capable of bringing it back if only she only had enough power left to waste, like her power was a resource she was just running low on. If she could get back her power...

Midna was her only chance at getting NEVA back so she could go home.

Despair quickly gave way to fervent eagerness, and she scrambled to her feet. "Thanks for trying to help!" she yelled as she bolted off down the path Link had taken.

Vanna ran right past the Spirit's Spring that Link had warned her not to go past, and kept on going over a bridge. She passed by what looked like another Spirit's Spring and went into a short, curvy tunnel. There was a fork in the path just beyond it; she could either go forward into another, much darker tunnel, or she could go to her right. The path to her right had a little cottage, and a young man sitting in front of it.

"Hey!" she said, running over to him. "Did you see a guy in green go through the tunnel over there, or did he go this way?"

"He just passed through the tunnel about a minute ago," he said. "But you shouldn't follow him, unless you have a lantern! Just because it's daylight doesn't mean it's safe. Even in the day, there are some caves and dank spots around here that get pretty dark. Here, you can take this!" The guy reached behind the rock he was sitting on, and a rusty old lantern was in his hand when he brought it back around. "I'm trying to drum up sales of my lantern oil by giving away free lanterns! It's a business tactic!"

She grabbed the lantern from him. "Well, thanks for the lantern, but I can't buy oil from you. I don't have any money."

He frowned. "Not even a single Rupee?"

"Are those—? No, I don't have any Rupees. If I need any oil, I'll be sure to find some money so I can come back and buy some from you." 'But I probably won't,' she added in her head. "Bye."

He said "Bye" to her, and she ran back the way she came, wanting to catch up with Link and Midna before they got too far away. The area just beyond the long tunnel was extremely hazy, and unnatural purple fog clouded the ground. Right through the middle was strangely lacking the purple fog, and Link's footprints were just barely visible in the dirt through the cleared route.

Another tunnel was beyond the foggy area. As Vanna was beginning to wonder how many more tunnels there could possibly be, she exited it and saw that there were no more tunnels in view. An absolutely enormous tree was just around a bend, but more importantly, Link was in front of it.

"...Link?" she called as she ran up to him.

Vanna slowed to a stop when she reached him. He was on his knees, sword and shield on the ground next to his limp hands, eyes closed. Midna came out of his shadow.

"Why are you here?" Midna asked. "Link told you to go talk to the mayor."

"I did talk to the mayor, but I didn't need to," Vanna said. "I need to talk to you."

Midna groaned. "I told you already, I'm not bringing back your bracelet."

"Because you can't, right? But you could if you only had more of your power. I don't know what happened to your power, but you're going to get it back, and you're gonna use it to bring back my bracelet."

Midna crossed her arms, tapping her fingers on them, and hummed thoughtfully. A freakishly wide grin stretched across her shadowy face. "Tell you what—if you really want me to bring back your bracelet, you’re going to help me.”

"You're the one that broke it!"

"And if you want it back, you're going to help me regain my power. Nice deal, isn't it? I get my power, you get your bracelet. What do you say?" Midna said, devilish grin widening impossibly further.

Vanna clenched and unclenched her fists, considering Midna's ridiculous offer in her head before she let out a sigh. She couldn't miss her chance just because she didn't want to cooperate with her. "How am I helping you get your power back?"

"Great choice! So..." Midna pointed toward the giant tree. "That's where you're going first. There's something in there that I need you to get. Link's helping me, too, so once he gets up, you two can go find it."

"Fine," Vanna said. She looked back down to Link, who was still frozen in his position. "Uh... Link?"

"I don't really know what's up with him," Midna said. "There was this golden wolf in the way, and it lunged at him. It disappeared, but Link just kinda ... fell like that." She shrugged. "He's not wounded and he's still breathing. He'll be over it in a minute. Probably."

It fell quiet, with the only sounds being the chirping of birds and a gentle breeze moving the trees. After about a minute of the awkward silence, Link let out a little groan, shook his head, and got to his feet. His eyes widened in surprise when he saw Vanna standing next to him.

"She's gonna help us!" Midna said.

"No, she's not," Link said firmly. "It's dangerous out here."

"Yeah, but... It's dangerous to go alone," Vanna said. She may not have known much about Zelda games, but she did remember that line.

"She's right," Midna said. Vanna was in shock that she was actually backing her up. "It's a lot safer if there's two of you. Besides, we made a deal while you were ... doing whatever you were doing a minute ago. She'll help us, and then I'll help her get her bracelet back so she can go home."

"She needs to go back to the village," Link said. His steely gaze turned to Vanna. "You have no idea what you're getting yourself into."

"I don't care. If it'll get me home, I'll do it," she said.

"You won't be able to get home if you die. I ain't just sayin' this 'cause I want you off my back, I mean it. You could die."

"So could you, but you're still doing it."

"I have a sword and a shield and chainmail. You're only wearing ... that, and you don't even have a weapon."

She shrugged. "I'll stand behind you if I need to. At least until I can get my hands on a shield and weapon of my own."

Link humphed and pursed his lips. After a few moments of contemplation, he sighed. "...Okay. But the second you get hurt, you're going back to Ordon."

Vanna crossed her arms. "What makes you think you're the boss of me? I'll go wherever I please."

"I'm not saying that to boss you around. I'm saying it for your own safety. Look at you," he said, waving an arm up and down. "You're a tiny li'l thing."

She couldn't hold back a laugh at that. "Have you heard of the pot calling the kettle black? You're the shortest guy I've ever met."

"I don't just mean you're tiny height-wise. You're thin."

"And yet again: so are you."

"But I'm muscular and thin. You're just thin. And you're, what, a fourteen-year-old girl? I ain't tryin' to be rude, honest, but..."

"I'm seventeen. How old are you?"

"...Seventeen."

"Can you two shut up and just go to the temple already?" Midna said. "We're wasting time."

Vanna dropped her arms back down to her sides. "To the temple?" she said to Link.

"To the temple," Link breathed out.

Chapter Text

The word 'temple' brought many images to Vanna's mind. Most of those images were of ancient, luxurious buildings, meant to be places of worship to gods just as archaic.

The inside of a hollow tree was not one of those images.

Though, it wasn't exactly true to say that it was hollow. The tree was by no means empty. There were two lit torches—because having torches inside of a tree wasn't stupid at all—on either side of the entrance, a wooden cage with a monkey in it up ahead, and behind the caged monkey was a wooden platform with an overgrowth of vines, leading to a round door.

"Do you think there's a Hobbit living back there?" Vanna joked, trying to ease the tension.

"What's a Hobbit?" Link asked.

...So Hyrule had Elves, but not Hobbits. Fair enough. "Nothing. I'm gonna try to get that monkey out of the cage."

As she ran ahead, Link hollered for her to be careful. Vanna was in the middle of rolling her eyes when something popped up out of the ground and lunged at her, and she let out a shriek and jumped back. The thing was like a gigantic blue Venus flytrap, with a big slobbering tongue. Link ran up to it with his sword out and quickly sliced it down. Limp on the ground, it shriveled up and turned black, and suddenly exploded, leaving nothing behind.

"What the...?! What the hell was that?!" Vanna jumped again when she saw something else coming for them. "What is that?!"

Link again ran forward and attacked the monster. Vanna probably would have been impressed by him if she wasn't so caught up in the sight of the monster itself. Its bones protruded from underneath its purple skin, and it had beady green eyes, braided white hair, and large, pointed ears. Its wrinkled face and sparse teeth made him almost look like an old man. A really, really ugly old man. In its right hand, that very nearly dragged against the ground when it was down, was a wooden stick that it tried to use as a sword against Link in their battle.

Unsurprisingly, its wooden stick was nothing against Link's blade. One swing nearly cut the monster in half, and it screeched loudly as it fell to its back. Much like the Venus flytrap thing had done, it turned black as it shriveled up, and then exploded into nothing. Link twirled his sword in his hand, looking to be showing off, before he sheathed it and turned to Vanna.

"That thing was a Bokoblin, and the plant things are Deku Babas," Link calmly answered.

"Why did they shrivel up and explode?!"

Link shrugged. "That's how evil beings normally decompose, really quick. It's a blessing. Does your world not have...?"

"Abominations like that that explode when they die?" she finished for him. "No, we don't."

They started to walk up to the caged monkey, who excitedly whooped and clapped at the sight of them. Vanna, however, stopped walking when she noticed there were huge spiders on the vines behind the cage. She had never been afraid of spiders, but those things were the same size as her head. Link didn't seem to notice them, or if he did he didn't care.

"Not gonna pay any mind to the giant spiders?" Vanna said.

Link looked back at her for a second before starting to fumble around with the monkey's cage. "They're not gonna come off the vines, promise. They're called Walltulas for a reason. You don't gotta stand back there."

Vanna slowly began to approach him at that, but she once again came to a stop. Her phone was vibrating on her belt. She quickly pulled it off and looked at it. A text message from Zi was on the screen. How was she even getting signal?

Where are you?

It took her a few moments to process, and then she saw through the deceptively simple words. Under normal circumstances, he never would’ve had to ask where she was; her mom, especially so since her dad had died, was so overprotective that Vanna was only ever at home, at school, at work, or at the Rider’s with him—and considering that they didn’t have school today and that he knew she was off work, the only place she could’ve even been was home. So he knew she wasn’t at home ... which probably meant she’d been caught. And if he knew she’d stolen NEVA, and he still had to ask where she was, that meant she hadn’t gone back to the testing room the second after she got NEVA back.

She gulped. It definitely should have been like she'd never left at all. Vanna told herself that maybe however long she spent in Hyrule was how long it would be in her world from her departure to her reappearance, for whatever reason. That was better than her initial thoughts—that her not appearing back right after she left was a sign she never would—but it was still much less favorable than no time passing at all there while she was away. There was no telling how long it would take for Midna to get her power back.

I’m guessing you know what I did? she sent back. Although she was pretty certain she’d been caught, she wanted to make sure, first, so she wouldn’t incriminate herself further if she hadn’t.

Yuuuup. My dad just showed me the security cam footage. He’s pissed. Seriously, what the hell were you thinking? And where are you?

Well, Mr. Rider knowing and being mad was just great. She was for sure out of a job whenever she’d get back home. Understandably, of course. Still, she wished that he would go light on her otherwise—especially if he knew that she had only stolen NEVA to try to get back one of his own lifelong friends, her dad.

I was hoping I’d be able to come right back before anyone would even realize it was gone. Tell your dad I’m really, really sorry. I just wanted to use NEVA to go back in time and stop my dad from getting into the accident...

As she hit send, Link managed to break the cage open enough so that the monkey could get out. It jumped up and down happily before climbing up the vines, ignoring the spiders on them. It waved its hands at Link and Vanna from the top. Midna came out of Link's shadow.

"Oh, is that the monkey that stole your lantern? It looks like she's beckoning you..." Midna giggled. "Aren't you popular?"

"Guess we should follow her," Link said as Midna went back into his shadow.

Vanna clipped her phone back to her belt. "That monkey stole your lantern?"

"Kinda. She gave it back, though. You should give me yours. You can't climb with it," he said.

"And you can?" she said, handing it over to him regardless.

He twisted around and opened up a brown pouch attached to the back of his belt, and held the lantern over it. The lantern quickly shrunk down to the size of Vanna's pinky, and he dropped it into the pouch. Vanna's jaw fell open.

"How did you do that?!" she asked.

"It's a magic pouch," Link casually answered.

Vanna was going to tell him to stop messing with her, that there was no such thing as magic, but she stopped herself. She doubted if even the advanced technology of her home would be able to perform such a feat. The only explanation for it really was magic, as much as she had trouble believing it.

Link killed the two spiders with a slingshot—that Vanna incredulously watched him retrieve from his pouch, amazed as it grew to full size in his hand—and once they fell to the ground, they shriveled up and exploded just like the other monsters had. She simply shook her head this time. Hyrule was weird.

He started climbing up the vines, and she grimaced as she watched him go up. If someone like him was climbing them so slowly, then surely she would have trouble climbing them at all. She didn't want him to get to the top and then have to wait for her to get up, though, so she went ahead and started climbing as well. Her phone vibrated against her hip about halfway up, making her groan—not that she could blame Zi, since he still had no idea where she was or what she was doing, but now was not the time she wanted to be getting texts. Link did end up having to wait at the top for her, but it didn't look like he minded too much. Finally, Vanna kicked her leg over the edge and pulled herself the rest of the way up.

"Shut up," she grumbled.

"I didn't say anything," Link said.

She dusted the dirt off her legs and hands. She'd definitely need to be getting some pants and gloves like him. "You were thinking of it."

The monkey tugged on Link's tunic and ran to the round door. They followed her, and Link rolled the door over with a grunt, allowing Vanna and the monkey to pass through. He came in after them and let the door roll shut behind him. The room they were in now was like a four-way intersection, with three more rolling doors that were clearly supposed to be accessible from a wooden platform in the middle of the room. Supposed to be accessible were the keywords, though. The gaps between the doors and the platform weren't bridged.

Link began to walk up the stairs to the wooden platform, but Vanna stayed put. Her eyes were glued to a ginormous spider, with the pattern of a skull on its carapace, hanging above the platform. The spiders in the last room were like ants compared to it.

"There's a giant ass spider up there!" she yelled to get Link's attention before he walked under it.

At her call, Link tilted his head back. The spider lowered itself from its web, landing on the platform with a thud. Link removed his sword from its scabbard and lunged at it. Vanna watched from where she stood for a few seconds before another vibration from her phone reminded her about Zi having texted her.

He's still pissed, was all the first message from him said. The next one had him asking again, For real, where are you?

I know you're not going to believe me, but I'm in Hyrule. Like, the Hyrule from those old games with the green sword boy, but real. I have no idea how. When I got here, this girl called Midna destroyed NEVA, so now I'm traveling with her and Link to help her get her power back so she can fix it and I can come home.

Reading over it, the whole thing sounded like a joke. She thought about erasing it all and making up a lie more believable than the reality she was in, but she knew she'd have to tell Zi the truth eventually, so she went ahead and sent it.

...How hard did you hit your head? Zi’s response read. That message was quickly followed by another. Where did you tell NEVA to take you? I'll come get you

Vanna wondered how she was supposed to prove herself when a screech from the spider Link was still fighting gave her an idea. She took a picture of their battle—Zi would have to believe her if he saw it. She sent the picture to him, along with a text: Didn't hit my head, and you can’t come get me. If NEVA shouldn’t have even been able to get me here, there’s no way a normal TPort could get you here to bring me back.

She got a new text from him just a few seconds later. Is he swordfighting a giant spider?!

Just then, the spider let out a disgusting screeching sound even louder than before, making Vanna look back at it. Link had managed to flip it to its back to expose its soft underbelly, and his sword was impaling it. The spider's body arched and writhed around, and it, too, shriveled up and exploded.

Yeah. Shit’s crazy. I gotta go. Text you later, Vanna hurriedly texted Zi. She put her phone back on her belt and walked up to Link with the monkey beside her as he sheathed his bloodied sword.

“Hey,” she started. “So, uh, just wondering... Are monsters normal around here?" She knew that Link spent most Zelda games fighting off monsters, but she was hoping that maybe they weren't actually so rampant—really hoping that she'd never have to fight off anything like that by herself.

"They seem to be kinda normal now, depending on where you are, but they didn't use to be normal anywhere. Evil is awakening them."

Evil—Vanna had never believed there was truly such a thing. The whole 'good versus evil' spiel was nothing more than a fantastical concept to her; the real world had too much gray area to objectively define things as one or the other. Morality wasn't that simple.

...But even though Link had nothing to show her that would physically prove that evil existed, like how he proved magic was real with his pouch, the way he spoke of it so assuredly made her start to question herself.

"Right," she breathed out. "...How are we supposed to get to the other doors?"

Link slowly turned in a circle, scouring the room. His eyes lit up after a few seconds. He reached into his pouch and pulled out a lantern—Vanna wasn't sure whose it was, not that it really mattered—and used it to light four torches on each corner of the platform. When the fourth one was lit, more wooden platforms raised from the ground, bridging their way to the door across from the one they came in through.

She was really going to have to get used to things not making any sense here.

The monkey scampered across the newly raised bridge and clapped at them from the door. They followed her, and once again Link let Vanna and the monkey out before himself. To her surprise, the door led outside. There was a large chasm in front of them, with only a rickety wooden bridge as their way over to the other side. Unreachable from where they stood were even more bridges, but those swiveled around every time the wind blew. The monkey ran ahead onto the rickety bridge, and just as she did, a baboon ran up from the other side.

It held up a boomerang that was emitting what looked like smoke, and the smaller monkey let out a squeal as she turned around and started to run back. The baboon threw the boomerang, but it didn't aim for the running monkey—it sliced right through the ropes of the bridge, making it give in while the small monkey was still on it.

“Oh!” Vanna's hands flew up to her face and her brows drew together.

The boomerang returned to the baboon, and it laughed wildly. He turned around and smacked his ass before running away.

Miraculously, the small monkey climbed up the broken bridge and got back to them, and Vanna sighed in relief. After seeing that the baboon was nowhere to be found, the small monkey ran back to the door and jumped repeatedly, waving her arms up and down and babbling.

Midna popped up out of Link's shadow. "What'd I miss?"

"Another monkey cut the ropes to the bridge while she was on it," Vanna said.

“If we can't go any farther, then, we might as well go back." She looked over at the monkey. "I don't know what's going on, but it seems like she wants to take you two somewhere, so maybe you should just follow her."

Midna went into Link's shadow, and though Vanna was certain they would have done it regardless of her input, they followed her advice by following the monkey back inside. The monkey jumped up onto a rope that went from the wooden platform over to the doorway to their left. She hung upside-down, grasping the rope with her feet, and motioned for them to come to her with her hands.

"She seriously wants us to jump to her, grab her hands, and then jump over there?" Vanna said.

"Looks like it," Link said. "Do you wanna go first or should I?"

She scoffed at that. "You really think this, what, thirty pound monkey, that's hanging by her feet, is strong enough to swing either of us over?"

Link ran forward and jumped right at the end of the platform. His hands clasped the hands of the monkey, and he swung back and forth once before he let go. He landed on the other side, then turned and looked at her.

"Yeah, she's strong enough," he said.

Vanna pursed her lips. If the monkey could support Link's weight, she could support hers, but that was never the only cause of her concern. She didn't think she could make the jump to reach the monkey in the first place—and even if she could do that, she was scared she wouldn't make the next jump over from the monkey, and she'd end up falling about fifteen feet down. She instinctively reached over to her left arm, only for her fingertips to graze against her teal shirt as a rude reminder that she'd left her TPort at home. She couldn't cheat her way out of having to jump.

Not allowing herself to think any more about it, she backed up, ran forward, and jumped off the edge of the platform. The monkey caught her outstretched hands and sent her swinging forward. Letting go of the monkey's hands, she flew over to the other side, landing on the balls of her feet and stumbling into Link. His hands grabbed her arms, helping her stabilize her balance. A corner of his lips was raised slightly in a cheeky grin. Embarrassed as she was, she was glad he had been there. It would've been a lot more embarrassing if she'd fallen over.

"Sorry, didn't mean to bump into you," she mumbled.

He let go of her arms. "It's all right. You would've fallen on your face otherwise."

She resisted the urge to reply that she wouldn't have, even though she agreed that she would have. The monkey jumped down off the rope and walked up to the door, prompting Link to open it. Beyond the door was pitch-black, and the monkey only took a step in before looking up at them with big, frightful eyes.

"Reach into my pouch and pull out a lantern, will you?" Link asked, sounding slightly strained. "Seems like our li'l monkey friend is scared of the dark."

"I don't understand why you can't get it out yourself, but okay," Vanna said as she got behind him.

"I can't get into my pouch without letting the door close, and that'd leave the monkey in the dark by herself."

Vanna reached around his scabbard and shield, and dug into his pouch, feeling a little awkward as she did so. She felt something glass, a roll of scratchy fabric, and something wooden, which she assumed to be his slingshot, before she felt the rusted metal of a lantern. She pinched her fingers around its tiny handle and pulled it out, and it returned to its full size after she did. She twisted the knob on it, making the flame start to burn, and she walked into the dark room with the monkey. Link slipped in after them, and the door rolled shut behind him. With the light of the lantern, they could see that a corridor to their right and a corridor to their left were the only places they could go.

"Left or right?" Vanna asked. "I say left," she said at the same time as Link said "Right."

"What if you go left and I go right?" Link suggested.

"That's how people die in horror movies." Immediately after she spoke, she realized that what she said would mean nothing to him. "Never mind, you don't know what horror movies are. But seriously, people die when they split up, especially when they go into dark places. We're sticking together, and we're going left."

Vanna walked off to the left, not giving him time to respond, with the monkey at her side. She heard Link let out a resigned sigh before he followed after her.

Chapter Text

"And would you look at that," Midna said. "A dead end with nothing but some pots. Nice choice, Vanna."

Staring at the pots, Vanna narrowed her eyes. "There's something in that one! It's moving!"

She went up to the pot, grabbed it, and flipped it upside down.

She didn't know what she expected to be in there, but she definitely wasn't expecting it to be a chicken with an eerie humanoid head. Startled, she moved back, ready to hide behind Link. The creature didn't really look threatening, but Vanna was wary of trusting anything in Hyrule. She glanced at Link, wondering if he was familiar with whatever it was. The way his face was contorted in something between confusion and disgust told her he wasn't.

The chicken-human-thing got to its feet and shook out its feathers. "Phew! Out at last! Gracious... Once I got in there, I couldn't get myself back out! Thanks for helping!"

"You speak English?" Vanna said in bewilderment.

It tilted its long, freaky head. "I am speaking Hylian, as are you."

"Okay, sure, call it 'Hylian,' whatever. What ... are you? Why were you in a pot back here?"

"What am I? I am Ooccoo! I've been looking for an item and my son, Ooccoo Jr. in here, you see. He must be so scared without his mother, gracious, yes! You must need something here, too. Shall we try working together for a while, fellow adventurers? You may not think I look like much, but I can be quite helpful! I can even warp you out of here if you want to leave!"

"Warp?" Vanna said. "Like, get us out instantly?"

Ooccoo nodded. Vanna thought it would be nice to be able to get out quickly, especially to someone like herself who was spoiled by teleportation. She looked up at Link, silently asking for his approval. He shrugged.

"Oh, but you must introduce yourselves if we are to be adventuring together!" Ooccoo said. "Tell me, what are your names?"

"I'm Vanna, that's Link, and that little shadow girl is called Midna. You should probably avoid her."

Midna grunted lightly and disappeared into Link’s shadow. Vanna smiled.

"It is good to meet you three, yes!" Ooccoo said. "Link, I do notice that you have a magic pouch! Would you mind if I resided in it as we traverse this temple?"

Link raised an eyebrow but nodded regardless and held it open. Ooccoo flew up to it, and like the items he stashed in there, she shrunk down and fell inside. Vanna got back up to her feet, and they started to walk back the other way.

"...So many weird things here," she said. "And speaking of weird things, what was up with you and that golden wolf earlier?"

Link pursed his lips for a few seconds. "He jumped at me, and the next thing I knew, I was in this snowy realm with a castle... I don't know how else to describe it. The wolf turned into a big undead knight in golden armor, and he taught me a secret sword technique."

"A secret sword technique? How can a sword technique be secret?"

"He said his secrets were only for the one who carries the blood of the hero... No other swordsman figured how to do them on his own, I suppose," Link said.

They came to a stop when they approached a giant spiderweb that kept them from getting out of the corridor. Link unsheathed his sword and slashed at it until it had been broken through enough for them to pass. Vanna ducked through first and headed into the room ahead, with the monkey and Link following behind her. One of those Deku Babas popped out of the ground, and Link dispatched it as easily as he had the last one. Once they were in the clear, Vanna took the time to look around. There were two more rolling doors on different sides of the room, though one had a lock in front of it. The sides of the room were made accessible by multiple wooden platforms grounded in the waters below. A bridge near the locked door led over to four poles topped with turbines before a gated alcove.

The monkey hopped over the gaps between the wooden platforms. She was clearly heading over to the locked door, but she stopped just before the final gap and cowered in fear. There was another giant spider hanging over the gap. It was smaller than the last one, and strangely had a checkerboard-like pattern on its carapace rather than a creepy skull.

Link shot the spider with his slingshot, and it descended from its thread. After landing, it promptly walked right off the edge into the water and died. The monkey cheered before jumping over the last gap and running up to the locked door.

"Not the brightest spider, huh?" Vanna said. "Why don't you go check and see if there's a key somewhere behind that other door, and I stay here with the monkey?"

"You just said that we shouldn't split up," Link said.

She shrugged and jumped over the gap, walking to the monkey. "Yeah, but we were in a dark corridor, and anything could've been in there. This room is lit, and doesn't have any freaks of nature waiting to kill us." Once next to the monkey, she turned back to face Link, and sat down on the dirt. "And the monkey doesn't wanna be lonely, so..."

Link chuckled lightly and shook his head. "Uh huh. All right, I'll be back."

He walked through the other door, and she could see out of it enough to tell that it led back outside, making her even more glad she didn't go. She looked at the monkey, who had sat down beside her.

"...You're cute for a monkey," Vanna said. "I was always kinda freaked out by monkeys. I never thought you guys were scary or anything, but you look so human and so not human at the same time, you know? Like robots before Mr. Rider came along with his Synthumans that look indistinguishable from humans. It's just really weird. You're all right, though. You remind me of my dog, Rade." She sighed, missing him already. "...You need a name. How about Rose? You have a rose in your hair, after all. Or fur, I guess."

Rose started to play with Vanna's hair. She held one long red lock in her left and another in her right, and repeatedly smushed them together, almost like she was trying to braid them.

"You braid with three sections, not two. Not that I really have any room to be coaching you on how to braid, though. You'd think I would be good at it, since I grew up in a family with three other girls, but..."

...Had her sisters or her mom taught her anything growing up?

She swallowed and pushed down the errant thought. "...Anyway, I'm really bad at it. One time last year I tried to braid my friend Maddie's hair and it got so tangled she had to cut it. She didn't talk to me for like, three weeks. I still think that's not fair. I mean, I'd be mad if she did it to me, but I'm not a silent treatment person. And besides, she knew what she was getting into when she asked me to braid her hair. I even told her that she may as well stick a full pack of gum in there, but she insisted, so really, whose fault was it?"

"I cannot believe you're talking to a monkey..." She jumped at the voice—Midna's voice.

"Midna?!" Vanna said, looking around. "Where are you?!"

"I hopped over into your shadow," Midna said as she came out of it. "Yours is more comfortable than Link's. It's also a lot more fun to be in the shadow of someone who talks to monkeys, or talks at all, actually. Link never spoke a word when we were alone together."

"Maybe because you're overbearing?" Vanna said.

"Probably," she agreed. "And, well, he hasn't been in a good mood lately. I bet he would talk to monkeys too if he wasn't so busy sulking because of his girlfriend being kidnapped."

'He has a girlfriend? Damn...' She knew it shouldn't have sparked the reaction in her that it did—she had just met the guy—but anyone would have been let down to find out he was in a relationship. It was like the age-old woe of finding out your favorite boyband member was gay—you never would've ended up with him anyway, but it still stung.

Just then, the door he had exited rolled open, and he stepped back through. He held up a shiny silver key between two of his fingers, waving it side to side to show it off. He jumped the gap to get over to them. Vanna stood up and brushed the dirt off her.

"That was quick," she said.

He only nodded in response. He placed the key in the lock and turned it, and the lock fell down to the ground. Rose and Vanna walked into the room after Link opened the door, and he followed. The room was round, with a higher level circling the edge of the room that gradually declined to an open lower one. In the middle of the lower level was a caged monkey atop a large wooden pole.

Rose quickly ran around the higher level, jumping from a bridged gap, and made her way down and to the pole. She climbed it and shook the bars of her friend's cage, desperately trying to free him. When she knew that Link and Vanna were aware of the second monkey's predicament, she climbed back down and looked at them pleadingly. They started to follow after the monkey, him a bit ahead of her. Vanna was busy taking in the scenery of the roofless, earthy room, bathed in the near-twilight that shone down from above.

She didn't even have time to snap out of her transfixion when the bridge suddenly collapsed beneath her. Vanna fell down and landed on the balls of her feet about four yards down, and tumbled forward onto her hands and knees. She squeezed her eyes shut and hissed as pain spread over her feet and up her calves.

"Are you okay?" Link called.

She just barely opened her eyes and looked up. Link had managed to make it across the bridge before it fell, and he was staring down at her with worry. "Fine," she said through her clenched teeth.

Vanna slowly got up, the balls of her feet and her ankles practically screaming at her, as Link raced down the remainder of the decline and came over to her.

"I'm all right, really," she reiterated.

Link didn't look like he believed her. Truthfully, the pain was steadily fading away. She knew she'd be fine. The drop wasn't high enough to actually impact her ankles or break her feet or anything—it was just enough to make them momentarily feel like it had.

Trying to walk as lightly as she could, she went over to the pole with the caged monkey. She already had an idea what to do to get it down: she just had to shake the pole enough to make the cage tip over. She knew it might hurt the monkey, but it was better than leaving it up there to die. There was only one problem... She wasn't strong enough. She pushed the pole with all of her might, and it didn't even budge. Vanna humphed in frustration and turned to Link.

"Think you're strong enough to shake this and make the cage fall, since you're so much more muscular than me?" she said.

"Of course I'm strong enough," he said. "It's just a wooden pole. I wrangle 500-pound goats for a living."

"You're a goat wrangler?" she asked.

He nodded and roughly shoved the pole, making it wobble. With two more shoves, the cage fell to the ground. It broke on impact, freeing the second monkey.

The monkeys’ celebration was interrupted by grating shrieks from up above. Two Bokoblins dropped down into the room. Vanna wanted to kill them herself somehow—if only to prove herself capable of something after not being able to move the pole—but Link took them down in seconds. All she could think of as she watched him was that he was a goat wrangler.

"So, what, you're like, part-time hero, part-time goat wrangler?" she asked as he put his sword away.

"I'm not quite a hero..." he said. "I've only been doin' 'hero stuff' for a couple days now. Before this week, I never fought a single monster. Been a goat wrangler for a few years, though."

"You... But you fought those monsters like they were nothing—and you only started fighting this week? You seriously learned that fast...?"

"I started training with a sword when I was little. I just never got to put my skills to the test until now."

Midna came out of Vanna's shadow and cleared her throat. "Those monkeys are waiting for you two over by where the bridge was. Maybe follow them instead of just standing around talking?"

"Why were you still in my shadow?" Vanna asked.

"Like I said. It's comfier than Link's. Now get going." She went back down and merged with Vanna's shadow. "Oh, are you gonna name this new monkey, too?"

"I might've named the girl monkey Rose," she explained to Link when he raised an eyebrow at her. She looked down at her shadow. "And maybe I will, Midna. Do you have any name suggestions?"

"He's a monkey," she said.

"Well, you just missed your chance to name him. His name is Poppy, now."

It turned out that Rose and Poppy wanted Link and Vanna to save more of their friends. When two more monkeys—Daisy and Tulip—had joined their little brigade, the four of them led Link and Vanna back outside to the bridge that the baboon had destroyed.

"Oh no," Vanna said immediately when they got out there. "No. Nope. Nuh uh. This isn't happening."

She knew what they were going to do before they even did it. As they had traversed the inside of the tree, there were several times when they made her and Link swing from their hands as they hung upside-down on ropes to cross gaps, and that was clearly what they were going to do here. Vanna barely wanted to cross the six feet gaps, twenty feet above ground indoors—there was no way in hell that she was going to jump from monkey to monkey across a thirty foot long abyss.

The monkeys positioned themselves upside-down, equal distances apart along the rope spanning from their side to the other. Poppy was the first in line. He grinned and waved his hands at them. Midna emerged from Vanna's shadow, smiling devilishly.

"Ah, is being a shadow wonderful! I'm so glad I don't have to do that," she said. "Looks like Tulip wants you to cross first, Vanna."

"That's Poppy, and I think he wants Link to go and me to stay behind...?" she said, her voice lowering in volume and rising in pitch with every word.

Midna let out a groan. "No! If I'm bringing back your dumb bracelet, you're going to work for me! You already made Link go get that key by himself! No more sitting around!"

"You've been sitting around in my shadow this whole damned time!"

"Masters sit while servants work!"

"When did you become my master and I become your servant?! If anything, you should be my servant as payback for what you did to me!"

"There's no need to fight," Link intervened. "Just ignore it. Midna said the same thing to me."

"What, and you just took it like a little bitch?" Vanna snapped.

He flinched at her final word, and then sheepishly muttered, "I couldn't exactly respond at the time..." He huffed and shook his head. "Getting into fights with each other ain't gonna help anything. It'll only make this harder than it has to be."

"What's making this hard is her and her snarky attitude!"

"I wouldn't be so 'snarky' if you'd just do what I say!" Midna said.

"Will you just get in my shadow and shut up?!" Vanna said. "I'm already helping you, I don't need your shit!"

Midna humphed and went back down. "Don't think that I'm listening to your command by doing this. I'm just tired of seeing you. Cross the gap, or you're not getting your bracelet back."

"Don't think that I'm listening to your command by crossing the gap," Vanna shot back.

She definitely was listening to Midna's command.

If she hadn't threatened to not bring back NEVA, then Vanna would have never thought about crossing the gap. She gulped before she took a running leap off the edge. Poppy caught her hands, and as soon as she swung forward, she let go and flew into Tulip's hands. Not once on her way across did she even let herself swing back; she wanted to get it over with as quick as possible. After a mere five seconds that felt like hours, she let go of Rose's hands and landed on the opposing cliff, stumbling forward a bit. She walked off to the side, not wanting to be in Link's way. Just a few seconds later, he landed next to her and swiftly fell into a roll that he came out of on his feet.

The monkeys jumped from the rope and went up to the door. Link and Vanna walked behind them, and he opened the door when they got to it. When all of them were in, Link let the door roll shut behind him, and there was a sudden thud. They looked back at the door to find that wooden bars had slammed down in front of it, keeping them from exiting. A screech in the room prompted them to look back around.

It was the baboon from earlier. He was standing atop a wooden pole in the center of the room, surrounded by a number of more poles in a circle. He lifted up his boomerang, still veiled in that black mist, and sent it flying forward. It cut through the stems of what Vanna had learned were Baba Serpents—which were basically bigger, angrier, red Deku Babas—that had been hanging from the ceiling, making them fall to the ground. They started moving themselves forward by chomping their jaws, coming straight for them. The baboon caught the boomerang back in his hands and started laughing maniacally. Like he had done earlier, he turned around and slapped his ass at them.

Link took care of the Baba Serpents, and the four monkeys raced forward. They all climbed the pole that the baboon had jumped over to and ambushed him. He flailed around, trying to get them off, but they hung onto him with all of their might. Link ran to the pole, and Vanna realized what he was going to do. Running over, she yelled for the monkeys to watch out before Link slammed into the pole. The monkeys jumped off the baboon for their safety, and he toppled over to the floor with a loud thump.

Now that she was up close to the baboon, Vanna noticed that what she had thought was just part of his head was actually a giant bug clinging to his head. She wrapped her fingers around the edge of the bug and tried to pull it off, thinking that it might be the reason he was acting out. Link grabbed on and began to pull as well. When the baboon began to come out of his stupor induced by his fall, he started to try to get back up. The monkeys rushed in to help once more, holding him to the ground. His struggles proved to be of help to them; with a rough jerk of his head, the bug came off. They dropped it, and Link stabbed his sword through it. As per usual, it curled up and exploded.

The baboon vigorously shook the monkeys off him and stood up. He scratched his head and looked around the room, almost like he didn't even know where he was. He slowly turned and saw Link, Vanna, and the monkeys. He let out a squeal and ran away, jumping out of the room through a hole in the wall. His boomerang, that he had left without, started to spin around in place and rose up off the ground. It was shining white, the smoky emanation nowhere to be seen. Glowing wind swirled around it, bringing up orange leaves on the floor.

"I am the Fairy of Winds who resides in this boomerang," came a soothing female voice. "You have freed me from evil, and I now have my true power back. Please... Take it with you, use it to aid your quest, and may both my power and my blessing go with you. If you focus power in your boomerang before releasing it, it will unleash the power of wind, aiding you in unforeseen ways."

It whirled around the room on its own accord, and came over to them. Vanna reached out and grabbed it, looking at it with fascination. She peeked over at Link to see his reaction; he looked less mystified and more enthusiastic, grinning with his mouth open. Maybe it was normal for Fairies to live inside of otherwise inanimate objects, or maybe this world was so weird that barely anything could shock him. ...Probably the latter.

"Do you know what she means about 'focusing power' in this?" Vanna asked—there was no point in commenting on the obvious.

Link grabbed it from her. He held it tightly, and wind started to circle it again. "She means to focus power by transferring your own magic power into it," he said.

She blinked a few times. "So, you're a goat-wrangling magic-wielding hero," she tonelessly said.

He winked at her. Her breath hitched in her throat.

Link broadly swung his arm and let the boomerang go. It flew up to a turbine above the door and made it spin around. As it spun, the wooden bars that had trapped them in went back up into the wall. The boomerang flew back to Link, and he caught it. The monkeys excitedly went over to the door.

"Looks like even the monkeys are satisfied now," Midna said as she came out of Vanna's shadow. "Okay, let's keep on combing this place."

When they were all back outside, the monkeys ran to the side of the cliff face, and they pointed past a bridge perpendicular to them. Beyond it was a pillar that housed another monkey whose cage was hanging from a tree, and another Bokoblin. A pole in the middle of the bridge had a turbine on top of it, just like the turbine inside. Link threw the boomerang at the turbine. The bridge spun as the turbine did, stopping just as soon as the ends met each cliff face. As they reached the end of the bridge, Link sent the Bokoblin flying off into the abyss with a swing of his sword.

Link then threw the boomerang at the thick strands of spider silk that held the cage to a branch of the tree, and the cage fell down and broke apart. Finally free, the new monkey celebrated and joined its four friends.

"Well, I guess there are still some monkeys you haven't freed yet!" Midna said. "At this point, you should just save them all and see what you can get for it! I bet they could help us find what we're looking for."

"What exactly are we looking for?" Vanna asked. "You still haven't told me."

"I'll tell you what I'm looking for when we find it..." she said. "But Link here is looking for his kidnapped friends."

"Friend-s?" Vanna said.

Link nodded, scowling. "Monsters raided my village and kidnapped all of the children. I was locked away in a jail cell and I managed to escape after being kidnapped, but everyone else... They could be being held captive anywhere."

Midna cleared her throat. "You managed to escape? I think you're taking a little bit too much credit there..."

"Midna helped me escape. I never would've without her," Link said. "Happy, Midna?"

"Very. Oh, and Vanna?"

"What?" she said.

"What's this monkey called?" Midna asked, mockery clear in her words.

"...Lotus."

Chapter Text

"And there's the last one," Vanna said with a tired sigh. Their search for monkeys came to an end with eight of them saved. Rose, Poppy, Daisy, Tulip, Lotus, Buttercup, and Daffodil were waiting for them in another room. "What should we call you? Lily?"

"That was my ma's name," Link quietly said. Vanna looked at him, and his eyes widened a bit. "But you didn't ... need to know that. S'all right. Call her Lily."

"Um, speaking of ... that... I meant to apologize to you earlier today."

He drew his eyebrows together. "Why?"

"For making you upset about your parents... And I wanted to tell you that I know how you feel. My dad's dead, too." She considered telling him that she actually wound up here because she was trying to get her dad back, but she didn't want to make her apology more about herself—him knowing that she could relate to him was enough.

"You didn't upset me," he said, turning around to leave the room.

Vanna walked beside him. "I didn't?"

Link shook his head. "They've been dead for nine years. I don't get upset at just the mention of them anymore."

She frowned. She still thought he looked upset that she brought them up, so she decided it would be better to stop talking about it.

They were quiet the rest of the way back to the room with the monkeys. When Lily joined the group, all eight of them climbed up a thick branch that reached out into the middle of the room, above a large abyss. Vanna felt the same dread come over her that she'd felt when they'd had to jump from monkey to monkey outside. Instead of them being lined up, however, each one was held around the ankles by the hands of the monkey above it. They started to swing back and forth.

"...You go first," she said.

Link nodded. He waited for the monkeys to swing toward them, then he ran and jumped. The monkey on the bottom of the chain grabbed Link's hands, and they swung forward. Link let go and landed safely.

Vanna lined herself up with the monkeys. There were several times that she started to run forward a bit, only to stop when she didn't think the timing was right. When she had the timing of their swings down pat in her head, she ran forward and jumped as high and far as she could. Her hands were caught, and she was swung over. At the apex of the swing, she let go, and she landed a few feet in front of where Link had. She was surprised her heart hadn’t given out by then.

Right ahead of them was a big rolling door, with a big lock chained in front of it, which had to be the matching lock to the big key they had found in the temple. Vanna's face fell when they approached it. From farther away, it didn't look like its size would be a problem, but up close it was clear that neither of them would be able to reach the lock, even if they stood on the tips of their toes with their arms all the way up.

"Hey Midna, think you could levitate up there and unlock this door for us?" Vanna asked.

"I'm a shadow. I can't physically interact with the objects of this world. You two will have to find a way to do this yourselves," she said.

Part of Vanna thought she was just being lazy, wanting her and Link to do everything for her, but Midna's excuse sounded legitimate enough.

"Maybe you can get up on my shoulders?" Link suggested.

Vanna looked up at the lock. That would probably get her high up enough to reach it. She agreed to do it, and Link handed her the key before crouching down on the floor. She situated her legs on either side of his head, trying to ignore how awkward it felt—not only because the situation itself was kinda awkward, but because of his sword and shield and dangling hat. She placed her hands on his shoulders to keep her balance and he grabbed her legs as he rose. When he was all the way up, she stretched her arms above her and placed the key inside the lock. She twisted it a few times, making part of the lock spin.

Link quickly stepped back when the lock started to fall so that it wouldn't land on him. His movement made Vanna lose her balance and start to fall backward off him. She ended up with the pits of her knees on his shoulders and her arms wrapped around his neck.

"Let me down!" she yelled.

Link crouched down again, and she got off him. Vanna rubbed the backs of her thighs; the edges of his wooden shield had scratched and dug into them.

"Sorry," he said as he stood up. "We both would've gone down if that lock hit me, and that wouldn't have been pretty."

"I know, but having wood grating your ass and thighs isn't pretty either," she said.

"If only there was something you could wear on your lower half to prevent things like that..."

She glared at him. "It was nice out and I didn't think I'd end up doing anything like I've done today. Just open the door already. Something big has to be in there."

Sidestepping the giant lock, Link got up close to the door and placed his hands on it. He jerked his body over, and the door went rolling open. Another door behind it rolled in the opposite direction. If rolling the first one didn't make the second one automatically roll, they would have been doomed. They ran through when there was a big enough gap between them, and the doors immediately rolled shut behind them.

The room was the largest they'd been in yet. There were several holes in the wooden walls that purple water cascaded from. The waterfalls fed a purple lake that composed a majority of the room. In it was a twisted tree, and Bomblings stood atop the few thick logs that floated here and there. Two spots in the water were bubbling.

The water bubbled more and more until two huge Baba Serpents, big enough to devour a Skulltula whole, burst out, and one of them lunged forward at Link and Vanna. She involuntarily let out a shrill scream and pressed herself against the door as much as she could. Thankfully, it couldn't get close enough to attack them. It slowly retreated.

Link pulled out the boomerang, and held it in his hand for a few moments before throwing it. The whirlwind it created picked up one of the Bomblings and brought it over to the head that tried to get them. The serpent grabbed the Bombling in its mouth and chomped down on it as the boomerang made its way back to Link. It chewed a bit before suddenly twitching and throwing its head back. The Bombling must have exploded in its mouth. It sunk down into the water, squirming as it went.

Link repeated the process with the other head. Vanna was about to say 'That was easy,' but she realized that that likely wasn't the end of it when the water started bubbling again. This time, there were three bubbling spots instead of two. The bubbles came up with more intensity as the entire room began to rumble. With a humongous splash, a monster just as humongous came out of the water, along with the two heads again on each side of it. Upon closer inspection, Vanna saw that the stems of the serpents were like its arms—it was all one monster. The monster leaned its main head forward and opened its mouth in three different sections, revealing an outstretched eyeball in place of its tongue. It let out a roar so loud that Vanna's hearing aids briefly flickered to white noise and the room rumbled again.

She quickly noticed that things could very well be going downhill fast. The logs and the Bomblings on them had sunk. Without them, there was no way to fight back. They stayed pressed against the door, where they at least couldn't be reached.

"Got any ideas on what to do?" she asked Link, her voice slightly shaking.

Just as he opened his mouth to respond, the sound of a whooping baboon rung through the room. The baboon swung on a rope from one of the holes in the wall to another. He reached into the hole, and his arm came back out with a Bombling.

"We could be saved by a baboon!" Link said.

The baboon grabbed the Bombling with his feet as he swung on the rope again, and Link threw the boomerang at it. The winds of the boomerang led the Bombling from the baboon to the mouth of one of the serpent's heads, and came back to Link. The baboon came out with another Bombling, which Link was intending to use against the other serpent. Instead, before the Bombling could reach the serpent head, the main one ate it. The monster roared and thrashed around in pain before its head fell to the ground with a thump, its eyeball exposed.

Knowing that she couldn't exactly do much, Vanna stayed back while Link ran forward to slash at the eyeball with his sword. With its eyeball mangled beyond recognition by Link's blade, the monster drew itself back up, and Link ran back to her. A bulge rose in its throat and it opened its mouth to spew out purple liquid in a large stream. They ran around to avoid the stream until it finally stopped. As the baboon swung back down with another Bombling, Link used the boomerang to make the bomb creature go over to the remaining serpent's head, and the main one didn't intercept it this time. The serpent sunk down under the water after the Bombling exploded in its mouth.

Link sent the next Bombling that came at the main head, and once again it thrashed around before falling and exposing its eyeball. Rather than attacking its eyeball this time, Link went for the inside of its mouth where its long, delicate optic nerve was attached. Slash by slash, the nerve blasted open until the eyeball was completely detached. The monster roared and reared backward. It wailed as it wildly flung its head around, slamming into the water and splashing it everywhere. Crackling sounds came forth from it as it began to shrivel up and turn black. Rather than exploding as soon as it died, it stayed up, hunched over in the air for a few seconds as the room made a transformation. Light flooded in, and all of the water turned light blue.

When it exploded, it wasn't quite like the other explosions that occurred upon the death of an enemy. Small, paper-thin black squares that emitted a black aura—similar to what had cloaked the boomerang—exploded outward slowly, the hundreds of pieces gently spinning in the air. Suddenly, they all came together to shoot toward Link and Vanna, and they formed a strangely shaped gray hunk. It had circles and irregular lines on it that glowed cyan every few seconds. Vanna wasn't sure what it was supposed to be.

Midna came out of her shadow and giggled. "Well done! That's ... what I was looking for." Her ponytail came up over her head, turned orange, and morphed into a big hand that she used to grab the item. She kept on talking like it was nothing. "That's one of three Fused Shadows. They're what the Light Spirit called dark power... Do you remember what that spirit said, Link? About how you had to match the power of the king of shadows? I think the other Light Spirits have the rest... If you two want to know exactly what Fused Shadows are... Well, maybe I'll tell you if you find the other two. I guess you'd better do your best to find them, huh?" She giggled again.

"Wait," Vanna said, "if Link uses the Fused Shadows to help him gain power like the 'king of shadows,' what about your power? How do you get yours back?"

Midna brought her ponytail-hand back to where it was and how it had been, the Fused Shadow disappearing in the process. She turned her body. "The Fused Shadows will help me, too. Let's not waste any more time here when we could be looking for the other ones..."

She floated forward a bit, and with a flick of her wrist, black squares erupted on the ground. They faded into a jagged black shape with glowing lines like the ones on the Fused Shadow. There were circular ripples in the middle that had more little black squares floating up out of it.

Midna went to the center and turned back to Link and Vanna. "I'll get you out of here... Just walk onto this portal."

They did as she said. Vanna wasn't quite ready for what happened next. Her vision went black and she felt her body break up into hundreds of paper-thin pieces. It didn't hurt, but it wasn't a pleasant sensation, either. She was left with an indescribably weird feeling all over her body after the pieces of it came together again. Her sight returned to her slowly.

They were now outside in one of the springs that she had passed, and it was night time. It had only been about five when she got to Hyrule. Had they really been in the temple that long?

She turned her head to Link, and he raised up a finger. He was staring straight ahead silently. She followed his line of eyesight, but nothing was there except a little pond with miniature waterfalls and trees behind it. It was beautiful even in the dark of night, but not ignore-someone beautiful.

He lowered his hand after a minute. "Sorry, a Light Spirit was talking to me," Link said. "He told me Hyrule isn't saved yet and that I have to leave the woods and go east, to Eldin. He said my kidnapped friends are being held there..."

Vanna wondered if Hyrule had mental institutes and if she should try to check Link into one. "Yeah, I'm sure he did. So, are we gonna go there in the morning? It is night time after all."

"'We'?" he said. "No. No 'we.' You can't come with us. It's not safe for you out there."

She furrowed her brows. "Midna said I have to help her, and I'm not gonna give up my one and only chance to get NEVA back just because you wanna protect me or whatever."

Midna came out of her shadow. "Actually, he's right. It really isn't safe for you, and you can't come with us."

"But—" Vanna started.

"I won't hold it against you," she interrupted. "Those lands are covered in twilight, and if you go into them, you'll turn into a spirit. Link, however, is the Chosen Hero, and that grants him protection from turning into a spirit. And I'm from the Twilight, so I just become my not-shadow self when I'm in it. You wouldn't be able to see either of us, and you'd end up alone and lost. So, Link can leave in the morning, and you can stay in Ordon. We'll come back to get you once he's gotten rid of the twilight in Eldin."

Chapter Text

Vanna let out a little groan when she woke up. Her bed felt so much harder than normal that she wondered if she had somehow fallen off it in the middle of the night. She opened her eyes.

And then she remembered—she was in Hyrule.

She was in Hyrule, in Link's house, sleeping on a thick blanket on the wooden floor. After they had come back here last night, they'd eaten a quick meal, and Link had put down some blankets and pillows on the floor for them to sleep on. Even though Vanna had been exhausted, she'd had trouble falling asleep. Laying there, her thoughts had gone wild. She'd never played a Zelda game, but she had played enough of other games to know that the first boss was always the easiest—and the boss they'd fought was the most horrifying thing she had ever seen, so what could outdo it? What other monsters were out there waiting for them?

Despite how troubling it had been getting herself to doze off, her sleep was nice once she finally fell into it. No dreams, as always, and she woke up completely refreshed. She sat up and stretched out, and looked over at Link, where he was peacefully sleeping a few feet away from her. Vanna got off her makeshift bed, sat down at his little table that she had put her belt on for the night, and grabbed her phone. She synced it up to her hearing aids and put on some music.

The song that started playing reminded her of Zi, and then it suddenly hit her that she had never ended up texting him again last night even though she'd said she would. Assuming that both her world and Hyrule were at the same time of day, Zi might not have been awake yet, but she decided to go ahead and text him anyway.

Hey, sorry if I wake you up, and sorry for not texting you back last night. How are things going? Your dad still pissed?

She got a response a minute later. Was up already. Things are fine, I guess. My dad's still pissed, but I got him calmed down a lot. He's trying to work on making new NEVAs so I can come get you. Where & when are you right now? Be as specific as possible

It's 6:33 AM, September 2nd 1598. I'm in Link's treehouse in Ordon, in Ordona Province, which apparently is technically not in Hyrule but it seems like it sort of is.

Got it. Am I there?

Vanna looked around Link's house before looking back to her phone. No...?

Zi's next text took a while to come through. Damn. Looks like my dad was right. He said it appears like there's some weird time connection stuff going on between here at home and there. Like you using NEVA kinda like ... broke the space-time continuum of our universe or some shit and stapled it to that universe. And that's why we're still able to text each other like we're in the same time. You're gonna have to wait until the new NEVAs are done for me to be able to hop over there, if I'm able to at all. The new ones might not be able to replicate the same malfunction, so you should still keep trying to get the original one back. Just... try not to get hurt, k?

She'd had something along the same idea upon realizing she hadn't returned home directly after having left, but hearing it phrased like that—like she'd broken the space-time continuum—made it sound so much worse.

Soooo, how was your first day in Hyrule? Zi texted. It was an abrupt change in conversation, but Vanna was thankful for it.

It sucked. Lots of creepy monsters and draining stuff. Didn't help that I was stuck with asswipe Midna. Literally the only good thing about it was Link. He's nice. Pretty cute too

Send me a picture of his face!!! I'll kill you if you don't. Love you

Love you too but he's sleeping right now

So?

Zi.

You creepshotted him yesterday when he was fighting that spider, don't act all high and mighty

But you wouldn't have believed that I didn't have brain damage if I hadn't

Well I won't believe you that Link is cute if you don't send me a picture of his face! I was doing some research on the game and he looked cute in it but I need to see with my own eyes

Send me a pic of him in the game, I'll let you know how he compares. About half a minute after sending the text Vanna received a picture of a 3D rendering of Link. It was spot on, ignoring the giant eyes, and she told Zi as much. He was slow to respond again.

Good but you're still sending me a pic later. Anyway, I did some researching, and I found some stuff I thought you'd like to know. You're in the game called Twilight Princess, from 2006. If you're going along with Link, that means you're going to have to go through 7 temples, plus 2 more places that are kinda temples but kinda not. You'll have to fight a boss in each one. Diababa in the Forest Temple, Fyrus in the Goron Mines, Morpheel in the Lakebed Temple, Stallord in the Arbiter's Grounds, Blizzeta in the Snowpeak Ruins, Armogohma in the Temple of Time, and Argorok in the City in the Sky. Then there's Zant in the Palace of Twilight and Ganondorf in Hyrule Castle. When you get to the bosses you should tell me. I can send you some strats to help you guys out

Reading the names of the bosses made Vanna feel like she was reading something in a completely foreign language. The only one that rung a bell was Ganondorf. Link defeated Diababa last night, but I think it might be a little bit before we get to Fyrus cuz Link has to go do some other stuff. You can go ahead and send "strats" to me if you want.

And if I don't want?

Then I hate you.

Ouch :(

Zi and Vanna continued texting back and forth, talking about anything and everything. It was only when the rumblings of Vanna's stomach started to become painful that she looked at the time and realized they had been texting for over two hours, and Link still wasn't awake. She got up and went over to the hearth to try to warm up the remainder of the stew they'd eaten last night by herself. After a few minutes of vigorously rubbing sticks together to try to start a fire, something poked her shoulder. She dropped the sticks as she jumped, and she looked behind herself to see an amused Link with tousled hair and sleepy eyes. She hadn't heard him coming because of her music. She went over to her phone on the table and paused it, making Link give her a confused look.

"Sorry, I couldn't hear you. I was using this to listen to music," she said, tapping it. The look on his face didn't go away. "It's high-tech, you wouldn't get it. Anyway. Did you get enough sleep?"

"I could've slept a few more hours if Midna hadn't woke me up," Link said, his voice raspy. He cleared his throat. "She said we should get goin' soon, and that she tried to talk to you but it was like you couldn't hear her. She also said you were too much of an idiot to get the fire going..."

Vanna crossed her arms. "I'm not an idiot. My people have just advanced beyond the stone age and we don't need to light fires to warm up and cook food anymore. If anyone's an idiot..."

Link raised his hands defensively. "I wasn't sayin' I agreed with her—I was just relayin' what she said. 'Sides, fires can be hard to start even for people who know how to do it. I'm quite lucky..." He crouched in front of the hearth and reached his left hand into it, and suddenly one of the logs caught fire. Link smiled up at her. "Magic power. I was never properly trained, so I can't do too much, but I can at least do things like focus it into weapons for stronger attacks and start a li'l fire with it."

"Can you show me it up close? The fire-making magic?" Vanna asked.

Link stood, held up his left hand, and pointed up his index finger. Vanna's jaw dropped as a small flame flickered above it. While that was the most awesome thing she'd ever seen someone do, her eyes were drawn down to the back of Link's hand. He had a brown mark on it that was one triangle comprised of three smaller ones. He must've noticed her looking at it, because he let the flame stop burning and moved his hand so he could look down at it too.

"Is that a tattoo?" she asked.

"No, it’s a birthmark. You think it looks like a tattoo?"

"Well, yeah. Normally birthmarks are little blobs that have no real shape, not perfect triangles."

"Really? I've never seen another birthmark, so I never knew if mine was unusual or not..." He shrugged. "But not knowing what's really normal is just one of the things you learn to deal with when you live in a village with only fourteen people."

"Only fourteen people live in Ordon?"

Link nodded. "Yeah. We used to have a few more, but..." He stopped himself, frowning for a second. Something must have happened to them; she guessed whatever happened was what had ended his parents' lives, or the lives of others he was close to. "I'd only met twenty people in my life before all this started. Twenty-three, now I've been out of Ordon."

"So Midna and I are two of the only people you've ever met that aren't from Ordon...?" she said. It was hard for her to imagine the isolation of living knowing only twenty-some people.

He nodded again, but he didn't look upset about it at all. "There are two others. Princess Zelda, and Coro, that boy who lives in the woods and sells lantern oil."

"Isn't Coro from Ordon?"

"I ain't sure where he's from, but he's not from here. He just lives nearby Ordon."

"I thought we were in Ordon this whole time."

"Once you get past the bridge, you're in Faron's territory." He went over to his counter and lit another, smaller fireplace underneath part of it, and sat a kettle on top.

"There are other settlements in Hyrule, right? With more people?" Vanna asked.

"Yeah. Up north there's Castle Town, to the east is Kakariko Village, and there are other settlements here and there that I don't know by name. Guess I can't be certain, 'cause I've never been to any of 'em, but I heard Castle Town's the biggest. My ma and pops visited there a lot, bringing produce there and all, and they always used to tell me stories about how many people lived there. They said on the busiest days, you could barely walk through the streets, and barely hear your voice when you spoke."

"Sounds like my home," Vanna said as she sat back down at the table. "There are 300,000 people in my city."

Link's eyes shot over to her, and he stared at her blankly for a few seconds. "Did you misspeak?"

"No, there are 300,000 people in my city," she said, smiling at his disbelief. It was nice to be on the other side, getting to see him react to something he never thought was possible. She could see the 'How?' written on his face. "I guess it's not just Ordon—I take it Hyrule as a whole is really small?"

"I don't know how many people live in Hyrule exactly, but I know it's got less than 300,000. If you asked me to guess, I'd probably say it's got less than a thousand."

Vanna almost snorted. "I went to school with a thousand other students." She was suddenly glad that she had finished her required classes before summer break, and upset that there was a chance she wouldn't be back home in time to attend her graduation in December.

"Ah, you went to school?" he asked.

"You didn't?" she slowly asked back.

"No. I was taught by my parents, and then by the other adults in my village after they died. We don't have a proper school down here. Schools are really just for the children of rich families that live in Castle Town."

"Wow. That’s ... kinda sad. In my world, schools are free and kids have to attend it for twelve years."

"Now that sounds sad to me," Link said. "Are you even a kid anymore when you finish?"

"Technically you still are, yeah. You start 1st grade at five years old, and advance to the next grade at the beginning of every year until you graduate from 12th grade at seventeen. Does that make sense?" she said. He nodded. "Good. Trust me when I say it used to make a lot less sense."

"I understand what you're saying, but to be honest with ya, it doesn't really make sense to me at all. I guess you just need to know a lot of stuff in," he waved his hand, "uh, whatever country you come from?"

"The United States of America. Sometimes it's called the USA or the US, but mostly we just call it America. And... Well, honestly, when you get to the later years, a lot of it is unnecessary stuff that you don't really need to know to get along in life. Like, I never learned what to do if I were to end up in some weird alternate universe with magic and man-eating monsters."

"I bet you're real smart. You can figure out what to do on your own," Link said as he retrieved two bowls and two teacups. He put teabags—which she was impressed that they had—in the cups.

Vanna silently took the compliment rather than saying what she was really thinking; she may have been smart in her world, but that didn't mean anything here. She didn't need to know coding and calculus, she needed to know how to light fires and prepare food that wasn't from a box with directions on it. She needed to know how to fight, how to defend herself, how to survive.

Link ladled the stew into the bowls, poured water from the kettle into the teacups, and took several quick trips to bring the bowls, cups, and utensils over. Vanna thanked him as he sat down. She picked up her spoon and was about to go ahead and dig into the stew when she realized that his head was bowed and his eyes were closed. She thought for a second that maybe he fell asleep—he'd fallen asleep like two seconds after laying down last night—but then it dawned on her that he was praying. Awkward as she felt about just sitting there while he prayed, she decided to let him finish before eating, letting her spoon hover above her bowl in an attempt to not be disrespectful. He raised his head and opened his eyes after a few moments, and wasted no time shoveling the stew into his mouth.

"You eat like an animal," Vanna said.

"Whah? Ah hungwy!" he said with his mouth completely full, giving her an innocent look. Some juice ran down his chin, and he wiped it off on the back of his hand as he swallowed. "A man's gotta eat, and if he has a gal like Midna hiding in his shadow that enjoys rushing him, then he's gotta eat fast."

"I rush you for your own good," Midna said, not showing herself. "The twilight continues to spread every second. I wouldn't really mind it, but I don't think you'd like it if this whole world became cloaked in twilight, now would you?"

There was that word again. Twilight. The stuff that supposedly covered the lands and turned people into spirits, that Midna was from. It was even in the title of the game that followed the events currently happening in Hyrule. Vanna had trouble picturing what exactly it was. It seemed to be both a condition and a kingdom in its own right, which she couldn't comprehend, and that was ignoring the factor of it also being a time of day. 

"Who's the Twilight Princess?" Vanna asked out of curiosity before finally taking a bite of her food.

Link perked up. "Twilight Princess? Midna called Zelda that the other day."

Given that Midna didn't say anything, it seemed she agreed with what Link said. It made enough sense to Vanna. If the title of the series was the Legend of Zelda, then it was natural for the subtitle to also be about her. She thought about probing further about the twilight itself ... but Midna would probably be the best at answering her questions, and she was more than fine with not speaking to her.

Things then fell into silence while they ate—or, they didn't talk anymore as they ate, at least. Link was far from silent as he gobbled down his stew. He finished it before Vanna was even halfway done hers, then finished his tea in one go. She could tell that he burned his tongue by doing that, but he brushed it off. He got up and placed the bowl and cup in his sink. Over his white undershirt and tan pants that he had slept in, he put back on the clothes he had discarded last night. Vanna scrunched up her nose when she saw him slipping his boots onto his bare feet.

"Feel free to hang around my house, sleep here, read some of my books..." Link trailed off. "Maybe just don't use the hearths?"

"What about food, though?" she asked. "Even if I did use them, what would I eat?"

"Go down to the village. They'll keep you fed. They'd ... probably enjoy the company, now. With the kids being gone and everything..."

"I'd enjoy the company, too," Vanna said. She grabbed her phone and stood up. "Um, sorry if this is a little weird to ask, but could I take a picture of you before you go?"

She was expecting to have to explain to him what she meant to get him to agree, but he responded, "Sure. I haven't gotten a chance to see how I look in this." Link finished his outfit by putting his hat on, and began to clear things off a wooden storage chest. Midna groaned. "It'll only take a few seconds, Midna," he said.

"What are you doing? I don't mind if your house looks messy in the picture, you know," Vanna said.

"I have my pictograph box in here. I'm getting it out for you."

She guessed that 'pictograph box' was what they called cameras. "I have my own."

He stopped moving things, and looked back at her with his eyebrows close together. "Where? All I saw that you had on you was your music-listening thing."

"My music-listening thing is also a picture-taking thing," Vanna said, waving it. She opened the camera app and held it up. "Smile?"

He mustered a just-barely-there smile, and she took the picture. As she was walking over to him with her phone in hand, he said, "You already took it?"

"Yeah." She held the phone out to him. "Here. You can tap it twice to bring up a little bar that'll let you zoom in to get a closer look if you slide your finger up it. Once it's zoomed in, you can move your finger across the screen to look at different areas of the picture. I can't print the picture from that, if you were gonna ask."

Link grabbed her phone with excessive caution, and awkwardly tried to hold it the same way he saw her holding it. He gently tapped the screen with his finger, zoomed in, and panned around before humming and handing it back. "Thanks. Thought I'd look worse after yesterday..."

"You'd look better in the twilight," Midna said under her breath.

"All right, all right, I'm going," Link said. "See you soon, Ilia."

"Ilia?" Vanna repeated.

Link's eyes widened. "Did I say Ilia...?" he asked. She nodded. "Sorry. Didn't mean to. Bye, Vanna."

"Bye, Link," she said as he walked toward the door.

He shut it behind him, and she stood in the room replaying what he'd said in her mind. She was curious who Ilia was—but more than anything, she was taken by the sound of his voice saying her own name for the first time. As she walked back to the table to finish her stew, she sent Zi the picture of Link, with an accompanying text: I take your request for a face pic and raise you a full body pic. You're welcome.

Vanna stayed in Link's house for some time after she finished her stew, just taking everything in. She felt like she learned a lot more about him from looking around his house than she had from talking to him. She might not have found out that he was a seventeen-year-old goat-wrangling magic-wielding hero by the items in his house, but she did find out that he was a glasses-wearing book nerd that enjoyed writing and taking pictures and didn't seem to care too much for tidiness or matching tableware, among some other things.

Though she felt slightly bad for messing around with some of his stuff, her curiosity got the better of her. After finding thin, rectangular, brown glasses near one of the forty-two books scattered about his house—she'd counted—she slipped them onto her face, only to promptly take them off because of how blurry they made her vision. Her inspection of the house led her up to one of the lofts, where there was a desk with some pencils in a cup, a dip pen, an ink bowl, a shirt, some cloth, and most interestingly, a worn book that looked different from the rest. Vanna flipped the book open to the first page, where there were four handwritten letters she had never seen before. It only took a second for her to figure out what they said—Link.

She went on to the next page despite the feeling she had that it was his diary. She probably wouldn't have actually read it anyway, but she quickly realized that she couldn't even if she wanted to. While Link was easy enough to be translated, there was no way she could have read one page written in that alphabet, despite its similarities to the Latin one. She closed his diary, and opened up the next book she found, wondering if maybe Link had come up with his own cipher or something. It turned out that that wasn't the case. The alphabet he had written in had to be the one used by everyone in Hyrule, and she let out a sigh when she found this out. If she couldn't read his books, then she pretty much had nothing to do in his house.

Vanna left Link's house and went to the village an hour or so after he left. Even though she knew only thirteen other people lived there, she was still surprised by just how small it was. Five houses were situated in a lush valley, with a lake off to the left of them. A dirt path led right through the village and up a hill that she couldn't see over. She was planning to go see the mayor first, but she ended up following the path to see what was over the hill.

Her heart raced faster with every step she took, not because she thought there would be something dangerous back there, but because she wasn't used to the freedom of going places by herself. If she hadn't been in such a state of shock yesterday, she would've felt what she was feeling now, but even stronger, running through the woods to catch up with Midna and Link. It wasn't a bad feeling though; she wasn't particularly nervous, and she wasn't scared. It was just exhilarating, to the point of being overwhelming.

When Vanna got to the top of the hill and saw that it was just a barn and pasture at the end of the path, she turned and started to walk back down. She went to the house that Link had said was the mayor's and knocked. The door clicked and opened about ten seconds later to reveal the mayor.

"Ah, it's you," he said.

"Yeah, it's me. Sorry about running off yesterday. So, um, it turns out that I can actually get back to my home, but... Well, I was with Link yesterday and—"

"You were?" the mayor interrupted. "How was he? When I heard Link had just left the village yesterday, I came out to his house to look for him, but he was gone and only you were there."

"He's fine. We spent last night at his house, and he left like an hour ago. He said he'll be back soon, and then we're gonna go look for the kidnapped children together." Maybe that was a bit of a lie on her part, seeing as she was really going along to look for the Fused Shadows for Midna, but she did want to help Link look for his friends, too. "He told me I could stay at his house and come visit the village some while he was away."

The mayor let out a disgruntled sigh. "Shame I didn't get to see the lad, but it's good to know he's doing well. I don't believe I got the chance to properly introduce myself or this village to you. My name is Bo, and I'm the mayor here in Ordon Village. Times have been ... rough, around here recently—but maybe a visitor could help bring some liveliness back into our community." He held his hand out. "What's your name?"

"Vanna," she said, shaking his hand.

"Vanna, welcome to Ordon Village. Let me give you a tour of our little home."

Chapter Text

Vanna's second day in Hyrule/Ordon—she still didn't quite understand if Ordon was actually part of Hyrule or not—went by quite well. She met everyone currently in Ordon, though some of them only briefly. There were three couples, then the mayor, and a guy her age. With the exception of a woman named Uli, they were ... not the most attractive people she'd ever seen, and she pitied Ordon's gene pool. She spent most of the day with either Fado, the one person her age, or Uli and her husband Rusl. Those three were the most bearable. The other two couples and the mayor were mopey, depressed people that she couldn't stand to be around for too long. Seeing them miss their children so much made her miss her family.

Her third day she mostly spent with Uli. Rusl, even though he had been badly injured when the village was raided just days ago, went off to search for the kids, and Vanna didn't want the very pregnant Uli to be alone. Uli said she was only seven months along, but she was already having somewhat frequent Braxton Hicks contractions and she looked like she could pop at any moment. Though it was clear she missed her son Colin deeply and was worried for his well-being, she stayed serene and collected. Vanna found it very calming to be in her presence.

Later that day she decided to go visit the ranch, and Uli let her borrow a pair of grayish-blue pants that she couldn't wear anymore with her belly, since Vanna was still running around in her bodysuit. Vanna helped Fado round up the goats at night time. It was fun at first but quickly became agitating when the goats decided they didn't want to listen. Fado told her that Link and his horse, Epona, could do it in under a minute, and she could barely believe him. It took the two of them nearly half an hour to get the last of the goats inside.

Her fourth day she spent with both Uli and Fado on the ranch, lounging around on the pasture and hanging out with the goats. She was amazed by those things. They were bigger than any goat she'd ever seen in America, and they were blue, each with a single horn that somehow formed in a circle. She fell in love with one of the baby goats, and it seemed to fall in love with her too, staying near her for most of the day. Vanna was upset when she had to leave it for the night, though she was happy to not be smelling dirty goats and their droppings any longer. Uli let her take a bath in her tub, which she ended up regretting. She had to use water from the lake, which was cold with autumn being just around the corner. It was made worse by the fact that hair dryers didn’t exist here. She wound her hair up into a bun atop her head so it wouldn’t lay wet against her back, but she was still shivering even with it out of the way.

Her fifth day, she was woken up in the early hours of the morning by a knock on Link's door. Since she couldn’t get a hair wrap, what with nobody in Ordon having hair past their shoulders, her hair had fallen out of the bun overnight and gotten all tangled. Vanna tried to fix her still-damp hair as she walked up to the door, and nearly jumped back when she opened it. On the little deck was a pointy-eared man wearing a tank top and short shorts, with heavily bagged eyes that were open as wide as humanly possible. He had on a tall red hat, and a pole with a short red flag was on his back. He held out a tan envelope.

"Hey! I am the postman. I have come to deliver a letter for a Miss Vanna," he said.

"That would be me..."

"It is a letter from Link." He handed it to her and hummed a short jingle. "My business is concluded! Onward to mail!"

The postman leaped off the deck and ran away, making a little noise with every step he took. Vanna shook her head and looked down at the envelope. It had a word in Hylian text written on the front, that looked like ilHhhH to her at first. She remembered that she had seen the same h in Link's name in his diary. After realizing that those h's were really n's, she saw it. It was her name. What she viewed as il was a V, and the H's were a's. It should've been obvious that it was her name from the start, but then again, physical letters weren't much of a thing in her world. She couldn't remember ever receiving one in her life.

She opened up the letter and looked it over, not knowing why. Even ignoring the fact that she couldn't read the alphabet, a lot of the letters were smeared. After trying to read the first three words—I qar pld—she gave up and decided to get someone to read it for her. Bo had told her he was an early riser, so she went over to his house and hoped that he really was awake.

His door opened a few seconds after she knocked on it. "Mornin', Vanna. Is something wrong?"

"Link sent me a letter, but I can't read Hylian, and it's smudged up. I was wondering if you could read it to me...?" she said, feeling slightly embarrassed.

"A letter from Link? This is great! I was startin' to worry for the lad. Come on in." The mayor moved over to let Vanna inside and closed the door behind them. He took the letter from her hand and chuckled. "The woes of a left-handed person, eh?" He cleared his throat. "'I got rid of the problem in Eldin. The little kids are in Kakariko Village, and they're safe. I was going to come back down to Ordon as soon as possible, but they wanted me to stay with them for a while. You can tell all the parents but Mayor Bo that their children are fine so they don't have to worry any longer. Let them know I'm with the kids, but they can't come back yet since there's no wagon in Kakariko that can safely get them home. Link.'"

Bo's face had fallen by the time he finished reading the letter. He looked away.

"Sorry about your kid..." Vanna said.

He took in a deep breath and slowly let it out, shaking his head. "She's sixteen, y'know. Almost a woman. And the other kids are all from four to ten, so if they're fine, then... Then she'll be fine, too. She's strong. She can handle anythin'."

So Ilia was the only girl in Ordon around their age—she had to be Link's girlfriend. Vanna suppressed a shudder; if this man was Ilia's dad, what did she look like? Hopefully more like her mother, but given that Uli was the only attractive Ordonian woman she'd seen, maybe it was actually better if she looked like her dad.

"I'm sure everything will be okay," Vanna said. "If Link could find the younger kids, he'll find her, too. Especially since they're... Their relationship. I bet he won't stop until he's found her."

"Just gotta pray that when he does find her, nothin' bad will've happened to her." Tears were welling up in his little eyes.

"Hey, you said she's strong, right? So she'll be all right." She patted his arm. "I guess I'll go now. Thanks for reading the letter to me."

Bo handed it back over and rubbed his eyes. "You're welcome. Don't worry yourself about tellin' the other folks 'bout their kids. I'll do it later when they're all up."

They said their goodbyes, and Vanna left his house. She slowly paced through the village, her head leaning back and eyes scanning the pinks and yellows that filled the morning sky. Ordon had such pretty sunrises and sunsets. She decided to enjoy the sunrise while taking a walk, since she didn't have much else to do. She walked down the path back to Link's house, and then down the sunken lane that led to Faron. The raised earth on either side of the lane had trees on it, blocking the view overhead, so she went into the spring where she could get a good view.

The sound of heavy breathing off to the side of the spring made her still. Vanna ever-so-slowly turned her head.

In an alcove was a glowing golden wolf, with a glowing red eye.

She turned to face it fully. "You're the wolf that brought Link into that snowy realm and taught him a 'secret sword technique,' aren't you?"

The wolf nodded.

A wolf understood her. What was next? Was a tree going to start talking to her?

"Well... What are you doing here?" she asked. "Link's in Kakariko Village."

The wolf stood and started to walk toward her, hackles raised. She took a few steps back, into the waters of the spring. Her heart started to beat heavier. She thought the wolf was supposed to be nice.

"I don't want any trouble! I was just telling you that he's not—!"

Her words were cut off with a scream as the wolf pounced at her.

She never felt him come into contact with her. Everything around her disappeared, leaving her staring into nothing. The unending whiteness before her then faded into what must have been the same snowy realm the wolf had taken Link to, and the wolf was now sitting several feet in front of her wagging his fluffy tail back and forth. Far behind him were white towers with blue roofs that looked like they met together at the base of a castle dozens of feet beneath the snow. Though snowflakes blew through the air, it wasn't cold at all. She didn't even feel the wind.

The wolf tilted his head back and howled, and in the blink of an eye, he was gone. In his place was a big undead knight, just like Link had spoken of. His head was a skull with a glowing red orb in one of the sockets. The rest of his body looked relatively normal, ignoring his prominent ribcage and the fact that it was colorless and see-through. He faded in and out of varying levels of transparency while his golden armor and weaponry stayed solid.

He got into a battle stance, sword and shield at the ready. Unsure of what to do, Vanna hesitantly raised her fists. 

"Do you truly think your puny fists stand any chance against a sword?" he said in a deep echoing voice.

"Well, considering that it's either my fists or nothing... Maybe a little?" she said.

He quickly swung his sword down on her shoulder, and she crumpled to the ground. "No. Look how fast and easily I brought you down. If that were to happen to you in a battle against an enemy—and it undoubtedly would—then your life would come to an end in an instant. Going against fiends without a sword and shield on you is asking for death."

Vanna stayed on the ground for a few seconds, taking deep breaths as the pain went away. She shakily raised a hand to where his attack had landed. She'd never bled before, and even just the idea that she could be bleeding terrified her. But—thankfully—she felt no blood, no tear in her clothes, no sign that he had attacked her at all. She slowly got up, her body still quivering. "You could've just said that..."

"A demonstration makes a better point than words."

She glared at him. Who the hell stabs someone just to prove a point? "I already knew that I couldn't survive without a weapon here. But I don't have anything, and you attacking me isn't gonna change that."

"Go to the basement of Link's house and search the crates. Return to me once you've found a sword and a shield."

Before she could respond, her vision faded into white, and then to black. She opened her eyes and blinked several times in quick succession; she was sitting on her legs in the spring, and the golden wolf was sitting in front of her. She groaned as she stood up. Water had flooded into her boots, the pants Uli had given her were all wet, and so was the bottom of her bodysuit. She took off her boots, socks, and pants, and put them in the grass to dry before leaving for Link's house, hoping none of the Ordonians would see her on the way, because it seriously looked like she had pissed herself.

Link hadn't left her lantern behind, so she had to use her phone for light in the basement. She groaned again when the light revealed that his basement had racks all along two walls that were filled with crates.

Fifteen crates later, she hit the jackpot. She found a sword, shield, and baldric in one of the crates, and she took them out. She looked in the crate to see if there was maybe anything else that could be of use to her, but it didn't seem like it at first. There was a little green dress, or tunic she supposed, a matching funny hat like Link's, some small brown boots, and a red belt. She lifted up the tunic and smiled; there was a pouch underneath it. She snatched it up, and to make sure it was actually magic and not just a regular pouch, she dropped her phone inside of it. Her phone shrunk down to a minuscule size, the flashlight sending out only a tiny beam of light. Her work done, she got her phone back out, put the crate away, and went back up to the main floor with her new items.

Vanna checked out her things on the main floor since she could get a good look at them there. They were all quite dusty. The metal shield had a blue base, with a shiny silver rim and decals resembling birds that were red, but most interestingly it had a golden decal identical to the shape of Link's birthmark. She wondered if it had been specially made for him when he was younger and he'd forgotten about it. The sword, once pulled out of its mostly brown scabbard, was more spectacular than she expected it to be. The blade had three large golden diamonds on each side, while the grip and part of the curved cross-guards were red. She put everything on—with a decent amount of trouble, mostly from adjusting the baldric to fit her—and left Link's house satisfied.

The wolf was waiting in the alcove again when she got back to the spring. Like the last time, he pounced at her, they ended up in the snowy realm, and he turned into an undead knight.

"You look much more ready to take on the perils of this world now," he said.

"But I'm not really, considering I've got no clue how to actually use what I got," Vanna said. "How did you even know that there was a sword and shield in one of the like twenty wooden crates in Link's basement?"

"I put them there myself. The sword and shield you have were mine in my younger days of life."

That made her feel weird. She was using a dead person's stuff.

"Wait," she said. "Are you ... his dad?"

"I am his great-great-grandfather." He got into a battle stance again. "If you are to be battling alongside my son, you must learn how to fight. Draw your sword!"

It simultaneously felt like she was in the realm for just minutes and hours at the same time. It turned out that the latter was correct. When Vanna left the realm, the sky was still pinks and yellows, but it was from the onset of dusk, not dawn. She had been in there the entire day. The Hero's Shade—which was what he'd told her to call him when she'd asked for his name—taught her the basics of swordfighting. Slashing and stabbing weren't too bad, but the spin attack and jump attack he'd tried to teach her made her beyond frustrated, especially the jump attack. She was certain that out of all her time in there, majority of it was spent trying to perform an at least adequate jump attack. She was so excited when she finally timed it just right and sent the Hero's Shade onto his back, though part of her felt like he only fell backward to make her feel good. He told her to return the next day to practice with him more.

She felt like she was hit by a train as soon as she was out of the realm. Exhaustion, hunger, thirst, and aches that she hadn't felt while she was in there washed over her. Wanting to eat and get to bed as soon as possible, Vanna put back on the clothes she'd taken off and went down the path to the village. She dropped her baldric off in Link's house quickly. Fado was just heading into his house when she got to the main part of the village.

"Vanna!" he said. "Haven't seen you all day! I was just about to start makin' my dinner. Wanna come in and have some with me?"

She accepted his offer and followed him into his house. He started grabbing things off shelves as she slumped down in a chair.

"Not sure where you were, but you missed a good day today. Feels like life is back in the village, knowin' that the tots are safe. I thought you might'a gotten back home," he said.

"Nah. I wish..."

"You don't like it here?" he asked with a frown.

She pursed her lips. "I like it. It's beautiful, the weather's great, the people are nice... But it's not home. I'm just ... starting to feel more homesick with every day that passes."

Vanna surprised herself by saying that. She barely wanted to admit to herself that she was homesick, much less someone she'd known for four days. She stayed quiet after her confession, letting Fado rattle on more about how excited everyone was about the children being safe, how the goats were today, and whatever else he wanted to talk about. She kinda zoned out after a while. Once they ate, she thanked Fado for the meal, and went back to Link's house. She fell asleep on the wooden floor, not even bothering to take off her boots or lay out blankets and a pillow.

Her sixth day in Ordon was a lot like her fifth. She woke up in the morning, went to the spring, and practiced with the Hero's Shade. He wasn't as hard on her as he had been the previous day. They actually spent a decent amount of time just walking around the realm, and Vanna took several breaks to go get food this time. Her seventh day was much the same, as was her eighth day. She had found by then that she actually preferred spending her time with him than with the Ordonians. He might have been scary to look at and a hard-ass while teaching, but he was a comfort to be around.

Around midday on her ninth day, the Hero's Shade and Vanna were taking a walk around the seemingly never-ending realm when her body started to shake around. It was like someone she couldn't see was repeatedly pushing her from the side.

"What's going on?!" she worriedly asked.

"Link is trying to wake you up," the Hero's Shade said. "I will return your consciousness now and go into his subconscious."

Her vision turned white, then black, and when she opened her eyes, she was sitting on her knees in the alcove. The Hero's Shade was in his golden wolf form right ahead of her, and Link was to her right, hands on her shoulder.

"You were with him?" Link asked, peering toward the wolf.

"Good to see you, too, but yeah. I've been spending a lot of time with him over the past few days, practicing with his old sword and shield. He said he wants to go into your subconscious." She stood and backed up, leaving room for the wolf to jump at Link.

Link got to his feet and drew his sword, and the wolf let out a low growl before pouncing on him. The wolf faded away as Link fell to his knees. Midna popped out of Link's shadow, smiling.

"Did you miss me?" she said.

"Hilarious. Have you considered becoming a comedian?" Vanna said.

Midna looked down at Link, ignoring what she said. "We would've been back a lot sooner if it weren't for him not being able to say no to the kids. But, good news is that Link got his horse back, so now it won't take too long for us to get anywhere. Link's going to talk to the mayor and try to plan out a course of action for us, and then we'll be on our way."

Vanna frowned. Their course of action would most likely bring them to another temple right away. Goron Mines was next, if Zi was right, and they'd be fighting Fyrus, which was surely some sort of fire monster if her knowledge of video game boss naming conventions carried through. On the list of things Vanna never wanted to do, be on fire was high up there.

"What happened while you guys were away?" she asked.

Midna recounted what all had gone down. Link had retrieved sixteen Tears of Light that belonged to the Light Spirit Eldin, dispelling twilight from the province. He'd found out that the Gorons, a tribe from Death Mountain, had recently turned their backs on the people of Kakariko Village. Link had tried to scale the mountain to find out what had happened to make them change so suddenly, but a hostile Goron wouldn't let him pass. At the request of the children, Link had decided to stay in the village for a few days, which Midna didn't seem happy about at all. As he was about to start his walk back down to Ordon, his horse had come running to him.

"So, you didn't really miss too much," Midna said. "Anyway, the Gorons only recognize strength, and Mayor Bo is the only person who was ever able to earn their trust through it. Link's not strong enough to take on the Gorons now, so he's hoping Bo can help him. We're certain that the next Fused Shadow is somewhere on the mountain, so we really need to get past the Gorons."

"What about me, then? If Link's not stronger than a Goron as he is, there's no way I'll ever be stronger than one. Maybe I'll have to stay behind again..." Vanna said.

Midna saw through her ploy. "There's no reason why you can't just stay close to Link while he takes care of the Gorons. But, you know, if you really don't want to go up the mountain, you don't have to... If you don't want your bracelet back, that is." She grinned.

Vanna clenched her fists. "I'm going," she said through her teeth.

She just needed to ignore the part of her that wanted to say 'forget about it' and get used to living in Hyrule so she wouldn't have to put up with Midna any longer. She needed to go home.

Chapter Text

Midna dove back down into Link's shadow, leaving Vanna to stand in the alcove until Link was finished with the Hero's Shade. Link stood up and put his sword away after a few minutes. Without needing to say anything to one another, they made their way out of the spring. Just beyond the exit was a reddish-brown horse with a white tail, white mane, white feathering, and a white marking on her face in a shape that horses from Vanna's world could never have. She didn't know much about horses, but she guessed from her size that the horse was a Clydesdale, or Hyrule's equivalent of one at least—she was huge.

"This is my horse, Epona," Link said, grabbing her reins.

"She's pretty," Vanna said.

Link started to lead Epona down the lane with Vanna walking beside him. He dropped her reins when they got to his yard, and they went down into the main part of the village without her. Mayor Bo was standing outside of his house.

"Link?!" he yelled. He leaned forward to get a closer look. "Whoa, it is you, Link! You're safe and sound! Your clothes... What happened to you, lad?"

"Bit of a long story," Link said as they got up to him.

"C-come quick! Inside, both of you!"

Bo opened the door to his house and ushered them inside. They all stood on the main floor together.

"So, the kids are in Kakariko Village with a man called Renado who says he's a friend of yours," Link said to the mayor.

"That's good! Yes, Renado's an old friend. If they're in his care, then we can relax." Bo leaned forward again, looking excited. "Don't keep me waitin', lad! Tell me about my little girl! You found her, too, right?"

"Not yet..." Link said with a heavy frown, not looking Bo in the eyes.

"I see... That ain't what I wanted to hear..." The mayor let out a huff. "But I guess I need to think of all five of those poor kids, not just my own... They're all in danger. What I should be askin' is how I can help out."

Link perked up at that. "I heard from Renado that you're the only one who ever bested the Gorons of Death Mountain in a contest of strength. Vanna and I need to get up there, but there's no way they'll let us pass right now. How'd you do it?"

Bo smiled. "With the help of a little secret. I can teach you the secret, Link ... but can you two promise me that you absolutely, positively, will not disclose it to anyone?"

Link and Vanna agreed to tell nobody, and Bo led them into the back room of his house where a raised ring was in the middle of the dirt floor. Bo explained that the Gorons tested strength through sumo wrestling matches that would take place on a ring much like he had. He gave a brief rundown of the rules and some basic techniques, but said it would be best for Link to practice with him first before taking on a Goron. After telling Link to wait in the ring and just wear his pants, he went to change into his own sumo attire.

Vanna was doing her best to hide a smile as she nearly skipped her way over to a sturdy wooden rack along the back wall. She hoisted herself up and turned around to sit on it, her feet dangling off the edge. She watched nonchalantly as Link stripped himself down to nothing but his tan pants. He was more muscular than she imagined him being, but not overly so, with no hair to be seen on his chest or under his armpits. She thought that if he was about a foot taller, he'd be perfect—but it was hard to think about that for long when she was pondering his lack of body hair, attractive as she may have found it.

"Do you shave?" she asked abruptly.

He looked taken aback by her question. "Um, no. A lot of Hylians aren't very hairy, even grown men... I come from one of the more hairless families."

She noted something off in his answer immediately. "How would you know that a lot of Hylians aren't hairy if you've only ever met like twenty of them? Especially when all the men here are hairy."

"I don't know if you've noticed my ears..." Link reached up and tapped the pointed tip of his left ear. "I'm not the same race as the people here. I'm Hylian, and they're ... well, just humans, like you. Their race doesn't have a special name like Hylians do."

Vanna hummed in thought. "I was meaning to ask you about your ears." She paused, then tacked on, "I like them."

As soon as those words left her mouth, she started to regret them. Was it weird to compliment people on their ears?

Her question was answered when Link let out a short laugh, and said "Thanks," with no hint of insincerity in his voice.

Bo came back into the room wearing way less than Vanna ever needed to see him in. She grimaced at the sight and turned her attention back to Link.

The two got onto the raised arena, and each took a turn raising one leg up in the air and stomping it down. At Bo's call, they rushed toward each other. Vanna couldn't help but cringe every time one of them slapped the other. Their slaps were so hard the noise echoed. Though they seemed evenly matched at first, Link ended up triumphing.

For their second round, they each stepped it up. There was a split second where Vanna was certain Link was going to go falling backward off the arena, but he sidestepped and pushed Bo off.

"Not too shabby, lad!" the mayor said as he got up. "You've gotten a sight stronger in the short time you've been gone, Link... Strong as you are, though, you can't hope to beat the Gorons wrestlin' with power alone. Those Gorons are made of rock! Naw, the secret to beatin' the Gorons ... is locked away in that chest." Bo held his hand out toward a chest sitting along the wall. "Take it with you, lad."

Link hopped off the arena, went over to the chest, and opened it. He reached inside, and his hands came back out with a pair of boots made out of thick sheets of metal. They looked ridiculously heavy.

"You can probably tell that iron is magic, lad. Those boots weigh nothin' if your feet aren't in 'em, and whoever wears 'em won't be easily pushed around, even by a Goron. If you're fixin' to fight a Goron, be sure to wear those boots. Let's be square, though: neither of you are ever gonna tell anyone about those boots! 'Specially Renado!"

Vanna got off the rack as they once again assured Bo that they wouldn't tell. Link went to put the boots inside one of his pouches, only to pull other things out first. He sat one of the rusty lanterns and a glass bottle filled with water down, saying the lantern was Vanna's and she could have the bottle. She dropped both of them in her pouch, along with her phone—fearful that it would fall off her belt and she'd lose it forever—and frowned as she saw how little room was left in there with just those three items. It looked like Link was storing everything he had in the smaller of his two pouches, and he still had more room in his than she did, because his items shrunk to a smaller size. She brushed her disappointment away, reminding herself that it could carry more than any pouch of the same size from her world could.

Link put all of his clothes and gear back on, and they bid their farewells to Bo. Once they were just outside of Sera's Sundries, Link's walking slowed to a stop.

"I'm goin' to my house to grab some food for our trip. I don't know how long it'll be 'til we're back here, and Kakariko... There's no ladies there, so—uh, if you need any ... female stuff ... before we go, then go talk to Sera," Link said. He looked uncomfortable, but not as uncomfortable as Vanna felt when she got what he meant.

'Kill me. Kill me now.' "Thanks for your concern, but I-I'm good. I... You don't have to worry about that," she struggled to get out. She could feel her cheeks tingling wildly. "And anyway, my pouch is full, so..."

Link stood there in silence for a few excruciatingly awkward seconds. "...Give me it," he said, holding his hand out.

Vanna questioningly raised an eyebrow, but handed over her pouch to him anyway and crossed her arms. He opened the flap and peeked inside, then slowly rubbed his fingers in circles along the bottom. He handed it back over to her after a minute of concentration. She looked inside, and all of her items were smaller, leaving plenty of room.

"The magic was aged and worn. Where did you even get that thing?" Link said.

"It was the Hero's Shade's, too, I think. You know, the big undead knight. And. Uh. Thanks."

"Welcome..." he said. There was another moment of painful silence. "...But like I said, I don't know how long we'll be there, so... You should still go to Sera, even if you think you won't need anything, just in case. And you can meet me outside my house after... Well."

Only so she wouldn't have to explain to him how much of a late bloomer she was when it came to that, Vanna acquiesced and walked into Sera's. She stuffed the items Sera gave her into the very bottom of her pouch, then thanked her and left. Link was just leaving his house as she got up to it. He climbed down the ladder and hoisted himself up onto his giant of a horse. He scooted as far up on the saddle as he could, then motioned with his hand for Vanna to join him. She gave him a wary look.

"Just put your left foot on the stirrup, grab my hand, then pull yourself up and throw your right leg over," he said.

"You say that like it's easy for someone who's never gotten on a horse before," she muttered as she took his hand and placed her foot on the stirrup.

She tried to get herself up an embarrassing amount of times before Link wordlessly got off Epona, grabbed her by the ribs, and held her up like she weighed nothing. She grabbed onto the saddle and threw her right leg over, then settled down on it. Link got up slightly slower than he did the first time, being careful not to kick her as he did.

"Wrap your arms around me, or you'll fall off," he said.

Vanna wrapped her arms around him as he said, but it was awkward to do with his shield on his back. Link made a short noise, and Epona started to trot down the path to Faron.

"...So, how long does it take to get to Kakariko?" she asked.

"Took me 'bout five hours to get from there to here, I think, but it might take longer to get back. Epona might need more breaks 'cause she's not used to carryin' more than me. But you also hardly weigh anythin', so..."

"And from Kakariko to Death Mountain...?"

"Well, Kakariko's right at the base of the mountain, so really no time at all to at least get there—but scalin' it... That's gonna take quite a while. We'll probably stay the night in the village and head up in the morning. I don't think the Gorons would take too nicely to us sleepin' on their grounds."

Five hours riding a horse while pushed up against a guy wearing a shield on his back with a spiteful girl hiding in their shadows, just so they could hike a mountain inhabited by powerful, hostile people that didn't want them to be there. How fun.

Riding Epona wasn't actually too bad, ignoring how uncomfortable it was to have both of them squished onto one saddle. Vanna loved getting out of Ordon and Faron Woods, and out into Hyrule Field. It was the largest stretch of unoccupied land she'd ever seen with her own eyes. She couldn't help but wonder why people would seclude themselves in tiny villages like Ordon when all of this land was out here. It'd be a beautiful place to have a home. She would have preferred to look out her window and see acres and acres of green grass than to look out her window and see nothing but the outside of the twentieth floor of the bleak apartment complex across from hers. As much as she wanted to get home, part of her felt like she'd have trouble being happy going back to that tiny little apartment after what she saw that day.

It wasn't all rainbows and sunshine, though. Vanna finally got to see the twilight; it was creeping up on the field from the north, a yellow veil shooting from the ground and continuing high up into the sky. Many Bokoblins were aimlessly wandering, trying to attack whenever they got near. Epona was able to plow right through a number of them unscathed and unbothered, at least. There were also some other smaller enemies that Vanna couldn't get a good look at, with Epona trampling right over them, too. The only monster that proved to be a problem were ones that Link called Kargaroks—basically another name for giant pterodactyls. He swung his sword at those that came for them while Vanna stayed as ducked down as she could possibly be.

They were nearing Kakariko Village when Vanna heard Link let out a deep growl. She assumed it was because of another pesky Kargarok, but when she peeked over his shoulder, she saw what looked like three giant boars, two with what looked like green Bokoblins riding them, and the third with a big fat green Bokoblin on it. They were clearly going to Kakariko Village. Link leaned forward, Epona began to run faster, and Vanna clung on to Link for dear life.

As they rounded the corner into the village, they saw that the monsters had come to a stop, and the fat green Bokoblin was holding up a limp child. Another animalistic growl ripping forth from Link, Epona sped up. Vanna lost her grip on Link as he leaned forward more, and she fell off the back of the horse.

All of the air was forced out of her lungs as she collided with the dirt, and both her vision and hearing went to static for a second. She heard Link shout that he was sorry, his voice gradually becoming lost along with the sound of racing hooves. She got to her knees and scrambled out of the way as quick as she could in case more Bokoblins would come down the path, the pain of her fall still throbbing within her.

"Are... Are you okay?" a wide-eyed young girl asked her. She was sitting on the ground, her right hand grasping her left arm. Vanna guessed from her clothes and round ears that she was Ordonian—she was Beth, then, the only little girl from the village.

Vanna knelt next to her. "I'm fine. What about you? Did you hurt your arm?"

She held it out. It was covered in dirt, but it didn't look to be bleeding. "I... I think I'm fine..."

A glint out of the corner of Vanna's eye brought her attention to a spring at the base of the village. "Why don't we clean it off in that spring over there so we can get a good look at it?"

Beth nodded, and Vanna helped her stand up. She was shaking as they slowly walked over to the spring. Vanna crouched down once their feet were about an inch into the water, and Beth followed her lead. She scooped some of the cold water into her hands and poured it on Beth's arm multiple times, revealing red scratches. Vanna gently used her wet hands to wipe away the remaining dirt, and poured water over the scratches again for good measure. She squinted her eyes as she stared at her arm.

"Is it just me..." Vanna said, "...or are your scratches fading away?"

Beth ran a finger along the scratches. "This is one of the springs of the Light Spirits. The water has healing properties." She pouted and looked down the narrow village. "Link needs to save Colin quick and get some of this water on him... He has to be hurt. All because of me..."

"Hey now," Vanna said, rubbing her shoulder, "it's not your fault..."

Tears started to well up in her greenish-blue eyes. "Yes it is! I was standing in the way, he pushed me, and then they took him!"

"Well..." Vanna paused, thinking of a way to comfort her. "It doesn't really matter what happened, because Link is gonna save him. And if Colin hadn't pushed you out of the way, and you were the one to be kidnapped, then Link would've saved you. There's nothing to worry about. Link will be back with Colin really soon, and they'll both be fine."

She seemed to think about it before nodding and wiping her eyes with the backs of her hands. "...Thanks," she said.

"No problem. You're Beth, right?"

"Mhmm. D-did Link tell you about me?" she asked, sounding and looking excited at the prospect.

"He brought up all of you kids, but none of you specifically. I was in Ordon for the past week or so, and I heard about you from your parents."

"Oh... Well, I heard about you from Link. Vanna, isn't it?" she said.

Vanna nodded, and for a second she felt similar to how Beth did when she thought Link told Vanna about her. She was curious what all he had to say about her.

Two boys walked up to them, and Vanna presumed them to be Talo and Malo, the nine-year-old and four-year-old sons of Jaggle and Pergie. Talo looked a bit short for a nine-year-old to Vanna—then again, the only Ordonian she'd met that was the size of the average American was Fado, who was a giant among the men of his village—but Malo looked like a baby. Not just in his round face, but overall. The purple bow on top of his head of downy brown hair hardly even came halfway up her thighs.

Beth introduced Vanna to the boys. The kids all seemed to still be in shock at the kidnapping of their friend, and none of them spoke much. They ended up sitting on a porch to wait for Link to come back with Colin, and a tall man and a girl slightly older than Beth came over to them from where they had been standing at the other end of the village. The girl clung to his robe, big brown eyes shining like tears could fall from them at any second.

"How are you all?" the man asked.

They responded with a chorus of "Okay"s and "Fine"s. The man ever-so-slightly smiled, and he looked at Vanna.

"You must be Vanna, correct?" he said. She nodded. "Thank you for watching over these children, Vanna. I was waiting near the northern entrance for Link to return with Colin so I could get the boy inside as quick as possible, but he's taking longer than I expected..." He looked down at the girl on his side. "This is my daughter, Luda, and I am Renado, the healer of Kakariko Village."

They both bowed, and when they came back up, Vanna bowed her head to them and said it was nice to meet them. They led Vanna and the children up near the northern entrance, where they could tell earlier when Link was near. With every minute that passed, the kids became more and more worried. Their worries were both released and raised at the same time when Link eventually raced into the village on Epona with an unmoving Colin in his arms. After Epona lurched to a stop, Link handed Colin down to Renado, and the other children, save Luda, immediately started to bombard the man, asking if Colin was okay.

"Please, stay calm, for Colin's sake," Renado said. "Let me take him to the Elde Inn to assess him for injuries. I will let you all know soon how he is holding up."

The kids quieted, and Renado walked off toward one of the buildings along the side of the village. Luda followed behind him, Malo walked down to a small building at the end of the village, and Talo began to slowly pace the ground. Link hopped off Epona, and Beth flung her arms around him.

"You're so brave, Link!" Beth said. "Do you think Colin is gonna be okay?"

Link sighed and rubbed her back. "We have to wait to hear from Renado."

The news didn't look very bright.

The Bullbo had trampled over Colin, breaking his left leg and crushing down on his abdomen. Renado said it was impossible to tell the full extent of his abdominal injuries, but it was more than likely that Colin had internal bleeding and ruptured organs, and it was possible that his spine had been broken and he'd never walk again. He had administered all of the magical potions he could to the boy, but he wasn't sure if he could pull through.

Of course, Link and Vanna were the only ones he told his full findings to. Renado had given the children a much less intense description of Colin's injuries. While he didn't tell them outright that their friend might not make it, he requested that they spend time with him, despite him being unconscious. It could have been their last chance to see him alive, after all. Vanna didn't want to intrude, so she sat outside of the room he was resting in while everyone else went in to see him.

She heard quiet gasps after a while. She feared the worst, but then she heard a new voice.

"Is everyone ... okay? ...Good. Beth... I'm sorry. You know ... for shoving you. Are you ... mad?"

"Colin," she said, her voice shaking. "How could I be mad at you? You saved my life..."

It was quiet for a couple of seconds before he spoke again. "I... I think I finally understand. I understand what my dad meant ... when he told me I needed to be stronger, like you, Link... He wasn't talking about strength, like lifting stuff... He was talking about being brave... Link... You saved me, didn't you? You... You can do anything. You can do something to help the Gorons in the mine too, can't you, Link?"

"I can," Link gently responded.

There was a moment of silence before more gasps came from within the room, but they sounded distressed this time. Renado asked for everyone to stay calm, and then assured them that Colin was merely sleeping. He said that the boy would need as much rest and as much peace as possible to recover, and he suggested that everyone else get some sleep, too.

Chapter Text

Renado was standing at Colin's bedside when Vanna woke up. His eyes flicked over to her from Colin. "Good morning, Vanna," he said, quiet as he could be without whispering.

"Morning, Renado," she said back just as quietly, kicking her legs off the bed she had slept in. She looked across the seven other beds in the room, finding that Renado was the only one not in his. Everyone else was still sleeping. "How's Colin?"

"His condition has not changed since last night."

"That's good, right?" she said. Renado raised an eyebrow. "Not good," she clarified, "but ... not really bad. He could be worse, is what I'm saying, so it's good that he's, y'know ... alive."

He smiled and looked back down at Colin. "Yes, it is good that he is alive. Still, I had hoped that him managing a full night's rest would mean that he would improve some..."

Vanna idly played with her fingers and pretended to be soaking in the details of the candle-lit wooden room. Renado didn't seem to be the type to keep up a conversation, or at least not while he was watching over a patient, so she was waiting for someone else to get up and break the silence.

"...It is four in the morning, you know," Renado said after a few minutes.

"It is?" she asked. She didn't really need to ask though, because it made sense when she thought about it. They had all gone to bed at around eight the previous night. Unless something would wake her prematurely, she always slept for exactly eight hours.

"Yes. Perhaps it would be best if you tried to get more sleep. You have a long day ahead of you, if you are to be scaling the mountain with Link."

"I've never been able to get more than eight hours sleep." She pulled her black boots on and got up. "If I'm not back before Link wakes up, can you tell him that I'm outside?"

Renado nodded, and Vanna left the Elde Inn. For the first time since getting to Hyrule, she was greeted by crisp air, and she crossed her arms for warmth. She supposed she should have suspected it; autumn was nearing after all, and she was no longer in the forest, but rather an arid region. She started to walk down the village, head tilted back, as part of what had become her morning routine over the last few days. She experienced yet another first—the sun had already started to rise during all of her previous morning walks, but the stars were still in the sky as she paced Kakariko. Vanna had never seen so many, and they made her feel a twinge of jealousy in her heart. She wanted to take Hyrule's sky back home with her.

Her morning walks in Ordon had always led her to the Hero's Shade, but she didn't have anyone or anything to go to in Kakariko, so she continually walked up and down the narrow village before she grew bored of walking and stopped to pet Epona. After a while, she plopped down on the side of the dirt road and rested her head back against one of the boarded-up buildings and pondered what their journey up the mountain would entail.

Scaling the mountain would suck, of that much she was certain. What she was less certain of were the Gorons. She figured that they were probably Hyrule's version of Dwarves, much like how Hylians were Hyrule's version of Elves. They supposedly were strong, mountain-dwelling people who mined, which matched up perfectly with her idea of Dwarves. Still, there was so much room for variation outside of the most basic of traits. Aside from the ears, Link wasn't super Elf-like in her eyes. Ethereal beauty, transcendental grace, a willowy frame—he wasn't quite there. Maybe the Gorons wouldn't even be short and bearded like Dwarves usually were.

As the stars were beginning to fade away, Vanna heard the door to the Elde Inn open and close. When she looked over, Malo was walking down the steps of the wooden porch. He started to walk down the village, not even sparing her a glance.

"Hey, Malo," she said as he got to the point in the road that she was at. "Where're you going?"

He stopped in his tracks, and his green eyes shot over to her. If looks could kill... "To the store."

Vanna watched Malo as he walked off without another word and went inside a building at the end of the village. She stood up, then, figuring that if he was awake, then maybe other people were up, too. Back inside the hotel, the smell of eggs wafted to her. She followed the scent into the kitchen where she found Luda. She offered her breakfast, and they ate together. Beth and Talo joined them in the middle of their meal, and after they were all done they hung out in the main lobby. Link was the last one to come down, at eight in the morning.

"Have a nice twelve hour sleep?" Vanna asked as he walked down the stairs.

Apparently he didn't sense the disparagement in her voice, because he responded with a sincere nod.

Link scarfed down the cold leftovers from breakfast and cleaned his dishes before he spoke to Vanna. "Let's go."

The children wished them luck, and they walked out. Link raised his pointer finger and ran over to Epona. He gave her some food he had stored in his pouch and stroked her with one hand as she ate out of the other. Midna came out of Vanna's shadow and stretched.

"Have you been in my shadow this whole time?" Vanna asked.

"What did I tell you?" Midna responded.

She rolled her eyes. "My shadow's comfier than Link's. But you haven't said anything all day. That doesn't seem like you."

"Because you were with the kids when I woke up, and I don't want anyone to know about me." Midna looked over at Link and narrowed her one uncovered eye at him. "Come on, Link!"

Link patted Epona and jogged over to them. Midna dove down into Vanna's shadow, and Link and Vanna set off up Kakariko. They followed the left trail as they got to a fork in the path. Vanna yet again found herself wanting to stay behind when they came upon a tall cliff face. It had metal fencing going all the way up it, at least, but it went up so high. She walked up to it faster than Link so that she could at least get a head start. He caught up to her by the time she was at the top of the cliff face, and they pulled themselves up and over at the same time.

Even though Vanna had spent a lot of time earlier in the day thinking of all the ways a Goron could look, and acknowledged that they could very well be different to what she imagined Dwarves to be, she hadn't fully been able to dislodge the image of a generic Dwarf from her head.

So needless to say, she was very much surprised when she did not see a stocky, hairy man, and instead saw a boulder with stumpy legs, long and muscular arms, and a fat head atop its shoulders with big round eyes.

"Ho! You are back again with a friend this time, human? You will never pass! Even two humans cannot hope to match our brute force!" it yelled.

It dropped down and curled itself up into a ball, and started to spin in place, like how characters used to run without moving on old cartoons. Link ran ahead some, dropped the iron boots down in front of him, and hopped into them. He bent his knees with his feet apart, and held his arms out.

"Stay behind me and to my left!" he yelled.

Vanna got to where he wanted her to be before the Not-Dwarf shot itself forward, dirt clouds puffing up behind it as it rolled down the incline toward Link. She couldn't hold back a gasp as the living boulder rolled straight into Link's arms. Link yelled as he turned himself and threw the Goron right off the cliff. It continued to roll down the path into the village, screaming all the while. Link brushed his hands together in satisfaction. He gave Vanna a concerned look when he turned his head to her. Her shock must have been more evident on her face than she thought.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"I thought Gorons were people!" she said.

"They are people."

"No they're not! They're rocks!"

"Yeah, rock people. You already knew that they were made of rocks. Bo said they were when we were in his house."

"I thought it was just a figure of speech! I didn't think he actually meant it!"

Vanna stayed a bit behind Link as they followed the mountain trail, and neither of them nor Midna said anything for hours—or, if Link or Midna said anything, Vanna didn't hear it, because she was listening to music the whole time. Numerous Gorons spotted them from their perches upon the tops of the high walls of the mountain, and rolled down at them, but Link flung them all down the trail. After several hours of hiking up the mountain with only a few seconds-long breaks to catch their breath, Vanna got the feeling that they were finally close to the mines. They were no longer on a narrow trail, and more Gorons were up on the multitude of cliffs jutting out of the mountainside.

While she'd hated climbing the grated cliff way back at the beginning of the trail, she would have preferred that over what seemed to be the only way up these cliffs. One Goron hopped onto the back of a rolled-up Goron, and as the one being stood on unrolled itself, the other one shot up into the air. It landed on a higher cliff, and then went through an entryway into the mountain. Figuring that she'd have to cooperate with Link to get the Gorons to curl up for them so they could get up to that entryway, she got her phone out and went to turn off her music. There was a text from her mom on it that she hadn’t noticed earlier.

Vanna's mom had sent her countless texts saying Are you okay? or How are you? since she'd learned that Zi was able to text her. Vanna had asked her to not text her those things so much, but she knew that was a hefty request for a worrying mother. She sent her a text back, telling her that she was okay, and asking if she would keep from texting her at all that day because she'd be busy, even though it pained her to not be able to talk to her.

After it went through, she looked through the texts she had received from her few friends again and contemplated finally responding to them as well. Bax had asked if she was sick, Nessa had wanted to know if they could ditch school together, and Maddie had sent a barrage of question marks and then angry-looking emotes. It had been a few days since the newest one had come through. She wondered if they'd given up asking where she was because Zi had covered for her, or if maybe they'd just realized that they didn't particularly miss her. Vanna and Zi had only been part of their little group for the three years since they'd started going to their school, whereas the three of them had been childhood friends, after all.

Zi aside, none of her childhood friends had texted her, she suddenly realized. And the thought made her tense—because what other childhood friends did she even have, anyway?

But then Link slammed into her, knocking that thought right off course, and they fell over. A ginormous, red-hot rock had fallen right where Vanna had been standing, and smaller—but still big—rocks started to rain down on the area after it. Still reeling from getting knocked over so abruptly, it took Vanna a few seconds to recognize that they were lava bombs. Because a normal mountain wouldn't have been bad enough—no, they were going to have to go inside a volcano.

"Whoa, that was dangerous! Is this the traditional Death Mountain welcome?" Midna said, coming out of Vanna's shadow.

She giggled, but Vanna couldn't tell whether it was because of her own 'joke' or because she noticed that Link was still on her. He got off her, and as she pushed herself up, she grumbled under her breath that he should've let it hit her.

"Why are you in such a bad mood?" Link asked, her sour attitude clearly having rubbed off on him.

Vanna groaned. "We just hiked up a mountain for hours upon hours to go inside of an erupting volcano, and you're seriously asking me that? I'm in a bad mood because I want to go home!"

"And? So do I!"

"Your home isn't in a different universe! Nothing's stopping you from going back to Ordon! Nothing!"

"Everything is stopping me from going back to Ordon!"

"Maybe you two should knock it off for now," Midna interrupted, "because that Goron just noticed you and he's coming over to fight."

Link and Vanna both looked to where Midna's finger was pointing. A Goron was stomping his way over to them, large fists at the ready. Link drew his sword and shield and met the Goron halfway. Vanna scoffed at the thought of Link's wooden shield holding up to the fist of that thing, but it blocked the Goron's punch with no problem, and the Goron went stumbling back. Link slashed his sword at the animated boulder, and though it didn't look to physically harm it, the Goron curled up into a ball in what Vanna assumed to be a defense mechanism. She climbed up onto the Goron, and Link gave her a 'What the hell are you doing?' look before it uncurled itself and sent her catapulting up into the air. A little squeal escaped her before she landed, and then she let out a sigh of relief. She peered down over the cliff at Link, wondering if she should wait for him.

She chose not to.

Intending to repeat what Link had done, Vanna drew her sword and shield and approached a Goron. She thought that she would have an even easier time than Link—her shield was metal, and his sword looked blunt and insubstantial in comparison to hers—but there was something she didn't account for. Just because her shield could take a Goron's punch better than Link's shield, didn't mean she could. When the Goron punched her raised shield, the force of the blow ended up making her get hit in the face by her own arm and fall backward. As her head collided with the solid ground, her hearing and vision flickered to static. She blinked rapidly as she rushed to her feet, her head swirling. She broadly swung her sword at the Goron and landed a hit, and he curled up. The remaining effects of her collision with the ground faded away as she climbed the Goron's back and got shot up to the next cliff.

Vanna continued using the Gorons to get up the mountain, and she only stopped to look back for Link once she got up to the entryway. She couldn't even see him anymore. Again, she decided to go forth without him, and she walked into the hole in the mountain's wall. It started out as not much but a dark tunnel, but when she walked farther into it, she saw that it broadened into a lantern-lit room filled with Gorons. She looked behind herself once, finding that Link still hadn't caught up to her. She drew her sword and walked into the room.

All of the Gorons promptly noticed her, and they did that thing where they curled up and rolled without actually moving forward. Vanna took a step back and turned her body slightly, ready to book it out of there if they didn't stop. At once, they all started to roll toward her, and right before she was about to turn herself the rest of the way around and run, a deep voice called into the room.

"Enough!"

The Gorons stopped immediately. They stood up and looked toward another narrow tunnel that led into the room, where a Goron slowly walked in. He was much smaller than the others, although still big, and looked to be older than them.

"Is this young one such an imposing enemy that you must all gang up on her? I think not, Little Brothers," the Goron said. He stopped, put his hands on his hips, and smiled. "Come here!"

Vanna eyed the other Gorons distrustfully as she heeded the command of the old Goron. She stopped at the bottom of the stairs that he stood atop, feeling the stares of all of the Gorons on her.

"I am a Goron elder, little human. I am called Gor Coron."

She nodded, unsure of how to show proper respect to Gorons upon meeting them. "I am a ... little human, and I'm called Vanna."

Gor Coron nodded back. "Because of certain ... circumstances, I must lead the Goron tribe in place of Darbus, our tribal patriarch. Tell me, little human, do you come from the village below?"

"Um, well, I'm not from there, but I got up here from there," she said. "I need to get into the mines, so could you maybe direct me there? Please?"

"You have done well to come this far. You are strong ... for a human. However..." He crossed his arms. "The mines beyond here are sacred to my tribe. Outsiders are not allowed in. Unless..."

'Shit.' She knew what he was going to say, and she didn't like it.

He smiled again. "I could make an exception ... but you would have to beat me in a contest of power. Are you willing to try that, little human?"

Vanna heard gentle footsteps come into the room just in time. She could have sighed in relief, but she knew there was a chance it was too early for that. "If my friend here beats you in a contest of power, would you let both of us into the mines?"

Gor Coron looked right over her head, and tapped his fingers on his arms. With a stiff nod, he started down the steps. Vanna let out that sigh of relief and moved out of the way, and turned to look at Link. She thought he would be mad at her for volunteering him to fight in her stead—she surely would have been mad if the situation were reversed—but he slipped his feet into the iron boots in preparation for his fight without any complaint.

Vanna guessed it made sense that Gorons were rocks, because they were just about as dumb as them. Not one said anything about Link's boots, though it was painfully obvious just by looking at them that they made him harder to push around. The boots created a loud bang with each laborious step Link took to get up onto the arena.

The fight ended much earlier than she expected it to, with Link as the winner. Though she didn't count the time of any of Link's three sumo matches she'd seen, Vanna was certain he beat Gor Coron faster than he'd managed to beat Mayor Bo. It really wasn't too surprising, given how slow the Goron moved and how old he appeared to be, but she'd thought it would be at least a little more intense.

Gor Coron rose to his feet, a grin on his face. He congratulated Link on his victory, then told them the story of the Goron patriarch. Darbus had touched a treasure inside the mountain while he and the four Goron elders were investigating the mountain's non-stop eruptions, and he transformed into a monster. When he began to wreak havoc, the elders had no choice but to seal him deep inside of the mountain. Vanna quickly put two and two together—Darbus was Fyrus, and it was the power of a Fused Shadow that had turned him into a monster.

"I ask this favor of you, young warriors," Gor Coron said. "Go to the aid of Darbus! Make no mistake, the spirits have guided you two here. I, Gor Coron, need your help... On behalf of my entire clan, I ask for your aid!"

Vanna felt bad as she agreed, because Gor Coron didn't know what was coming for Darbus. She was almost 100% certain that they would have no choice but to kill him. They needed that Fused Shadow, so that she could go home. She tried to reassure herself that she wasn't being entirely selfish; it would be better for Darbus to just put him out of his misery rather than letting him stay a monster. Still, she would feel bad about killing him, knowing that he had been a ... 'person,' at some point. At least Diababa was probably only a Deku Baba or Baba Serpent before it got corrupted by the Fused Shadow.

Gor Coron instructed the two Gorons guarding the tunnel he had walked in from to let them pass. Vanna walked in first, hearing Link's heavy footsteps a ways behind her. The farther she got into the tunnel, the hotter it became. By the time she walked out of the tunnel and into the mines, the temperature was almost unbearable, and she didn't have to walk too far into the mines to see the cause—a river of magma flowed down the center of the long room. She let out a sigh and maneuvered around to get her cropped overshirt off without having to take off her baldric.

This was going to be miserable.

Chapter Text

It made Vanna feel good, in the worst way, to see that Link couldn't handle the heat as well as she could.

He had them take a lunch break as soon as he got into the mines, during which time he chugged down an entire canteen filled with water that Luda had given him. He restrained himself from drinking any more out of the other canteen he had, despite how much he was itching to. As Vanna sipped the water from the first of her two canteens, Link gave her a worried look.

"...You should drink more," he said, his voice slightly quiet. "You have to be dehydrated."

"If one of us is dehydrated, it's clearly you, judging by how much you've drunk. Not that I want you to pass out from dehydration or anything, but you really should've drunk less. No one knows how long we'll be in here, and you've finished half your water supply before we even started anything," she said.

"You're not even sweating."

"Women don't sweat as much as men," she said with a shrug. “I’ve never been the kind of person to get all sweaty, even when it’s really hot.”

Link made a noise of displeasure before removing his belt and his baldric. Before Vanna could ask what he was doing, he took off his green tunic and chain mail, his long pointy hat falling off in the process. A very unpleasant smell drifted over to her as he lifted his arms, making her scrunch her nose up and scoot backward. He had never smelled the best to her, but he really didn't smell good now. His current odor was entirely repulsive, unlike his old earthy scent of trees and dirt with a tinge of what Vanna could now identify as goat manure.

He placed his shirts in his pouch, seemingly unaffected by his own stench. He then strapped his baldric over his undershirt that was absolutely drenched in sweat around his neck and armpits, and buckled his belt around his hips. Link picked up his hat from behind him and put it back on his head, then stood up and put his canteens away.

"Have fun with your impending heat stroke because of that stupid hat," Vanna said as she got up.

He reached up to touch his hat and frowned, looking hurt. "My hat ain't stupid... I can handle being a little warmer if it means feeling a lot more at ease. I've gotten so used to wearin' my hat that I feel weird without it."

"Your hat is definitely stupid."

Link glared at her and started down what little of the path there was before the magma lake, grumbling "My hat is not stupid" under his breath. She laughed quietly as she followed him, and he glared back at her again.

"What's so funny back there?"

"What's funny is you getting worked up over a hat," she said.

He stopped walking and turned to face her. "This ain't just any ole hat. This hat was given to me by a Light Spirit, and it was once worn by an ancient hero who saved Hyrule."

"'Any ole hat' or not, you have to admit it looks funny."

"You've got no room to be talking about my hat when you wear a shirt that doesn't even go past your ribs. Don't you know that shirts are supposed to cover your entire torso?"

"Says the one who wears a shirt so long it's practically a dress."

"It's called a tunic."

"And my shirt is called a crop top."

Link rolled his eyes and let out a long breath through his nose. "Whatever. Let's just find Darbus, get the Fused Shadow, and get out of here."

"Fine."

With that word, the quiet returned.

Vanna had always hated the quiet. Having only the sound of the magma lake bubbling over top of the constant electric hum produced by her hearing aids was maddening, but it wasn't like she could get her phone out and start listening to music. They had to hop over dangerous chasms and avoid geysers of magma to make it to the end of the sweltering room. One second of distraction was all it would take for her to make a wrong step and fall to her death. She wished she had the concentration of a Synthuman.

They were out of the long room after several of the most stressful moments of Vanna's life, and outside into what she supposed was the main area of the mines. Large and stationary metal cranes hung over platforms that rose out of the lava, and metal ramps and gratings were connected to form entrances to different rooms back inside. They took the only path they could take from where they were, ending up in a room with more magma geysers and chasms, and...

"Since when do alligators live inside of volcanoes?" she said.

"You mean the Dodongo? They've always lived in the volcano regions," Link said.

Alligator or Dodongo, it was actually a strangely comforting sight in a way. In the midst of this unfamiliar world, at least there was something else that her world had, too, even if that something was slightly different with its purple gecko-like toes and orange tail.

"Don't jump down here 'til I tell you to," Link said. "Those things are real dangerous. Just let me take care of it."

"You're a goat wrangler, not a 'Dodongo' wrangler. Do you want to get eaten?"

He looked at her like she had just said the most ridiculous thing he'd ever heard. "I ain't gonna wrangle it, I'm gonna kill it!"

Vanna stared in disbelief as he hopped down and ran over to the Dodongo, sword and shield at the ready. The Dodongo opened its mouth wide and she cringed away, thinking it was about to lunge forward and bite Link. Instead, Link jumped over to the side just as fire began to erupt from its mouth.

"The alligators breathe fire," she whispered. "They. Breathe. Fire?"

The Dodongo was even more dangerous than she thought—and Link was even stupider than she thought.

"Get away from that thing!" she yelled.

"I've got it, calm down!" Link yelled back.

He jumped to the side again as the Dodongo sent another stream of flames his way. Link raced around to its back and slashed his sword down at its orange tail repeatedly. It exploded into nothing after a good ten slashes at its tail, just like the Deku Babas and Skulltulas and Bokoblins did, and she was finally able to breathe normally again.

"...Link?" Vanna said.

He looked up at her. "Hm?"

She jumped down and walked over to him. "How can you tell what creatures are evil and what creatures aren't?"

Link raised an eyebrow. "Evil creatures want to kill you."

"I know that already. How do you know which creatures want to kill you?"

"Well, typically the ones who want to kill you will try to kill you."

Vanna huffed. He walked up to the edge of the rock platform they were standing on, and motioned with his hand for her to come with him as he jumped over onto another. She followed him, hopping from rock to rock until they got to the other side of the large platform. There was a big metal chain attached to a concrete slab that went through the middle part of the platform that was sectioned off by two walls.

"Let me put it this way," she said. "How do you know that Dodongos are evil when other animals like goats aren't evil? Don't answer something stupid like 'Goats won't try to kill you.' There has to be some other way you know."

Link shrugged. "I've read a lot of books that have monsters in them, so I recognize them from those. I'll tell you about the monsters we see when we see them, okay?" She nodded. "Just remember that it's best for you to be careful around anything that isn't a person."

"I don't know what classifies a person as a person here either, though," she said, frowning. "If you hadn't told me Gorons were people, I wouldn't have considered them to be. In my world, the only people are other humans like me."

"Hyrule has humans like you, Hylians like me, and Gorons, Zoras, Fairies... We used to have a few more kinds of people, but those are the only ones left, that I know of at least. Zoras are fish people, and Fairies are these tiny little people who fly around with wings. You'll know what I mean if you see them."

She was about to tell him that she knew what Fairies were even though they were nothing more than fiction in her world, but she didn't want their conversation to go there. "Why would fish people be considered people more than Bokoblins, though? Bokoblins just look like a really ugly green or purple mix between Hylians and apes. I know they're evil, but why does that negate their personhood? I'm sure there are Hylians that have done evil things."

"The green guys aren't Bokoblins. They're Bulblins. There's a difference, and not just in their skin color. Look closer next time you see one." Link picked up the chain and turned it over in his hands. "And yeah, Hylians can do evil things, but we aren't inherently evil like Bokoblins and Bulblins are. We're the chosen people of the Goddesses, we weren't born of evil." He paused and looked at her. "Was there another path we could've taken?"

"No, this was the only way. Give me that." She grabbed the chain's handle from him and tugged on it, making the slab pull out of the wall the tiniest bit. "The exit from this room has to be hidden behind that slab. We need to pull it out as far as we can."

Link took hold of the other side of the handle, and together they pulled it back, the slab sliding out along with it. When it got to the point where they could pull it out no farther, they dropped the chain, and as soon as they did the slab began to slowly slide back. They exchanged a quick glance of confirmation, their eyes saying the word that their mouths didn't—run.

They barely made it within the short window of time they had, the slab blocking them off from the rest of the room just seconds after they got past it. As Vanna suspected, there was a door right in front of them, another one of the weird round rolling doors that seemed to be the standard in temples. Unlike the rock doors in the last temple, these were made of wood, with a metal decal in the middle and metal around the rims.

"Kinda dumb to have wooden doors in here, don't you think?" she said. "It's like the torches inside of the temple in the woods. Is it not common knowledge in Hyrule that fire and wood don't mix?"

Link narrowed his eyes at her, still trying to catch his breath from their dash over here. "Just because our world may not be as 'advanced' as yours is doesn't mean we're stupid."

"You've been carrying around a wooden shield inside of a volcano that has fire-breathing creatures."

She could practically see the 'Oh, right,' look on his face. "I know it's not ideal," he said, "but I need a shield, and it's all I got."

Vanna pulled hers off her baldric and held it over to him. "Take mine. You're the one that wants to fight. You need it more than me."

"But you—"

"Take it," she said. It should have been his in the first place anyway; it belonged to his great-great-grandfather, not hers.

With a sigh, Link dropped his wooden shield into his pouch, and attached the metal one to his baldric. He looked more of a hero with his ancestor's shield on his back, more right. Vanna remembered how his birthmark matched the golden design on the shield, like it was made for him to hold.

...But how had his great-great-grandfather known, in his youth when that shield had belonged to him, that his great-great-grandson would someday carry the shield and be born with that same mark?

Link placed both his hands on the wooden door, and before he opened it, he looked back at her and said, "So you know—I don't want to fight."

She nearly snorted. Sure looked like he wanted to fight when he hopped right on down to fight that Dodongo.

The room the door led to was much smaller, and much cooler, with no magma inside. Instead, there was a pool of water with a metal fence halfway through it. There were two floors in one, with a higher door and a lower door in sight, but they both looked impossible to get to, both too high up.

Midna emerged from Vanna's shadow. "That's weird. This place is pretty cool. Good place to take a bath?"

"You could use one," Vanna said to Link.

Midna giggled at her comment. Link looked like he took offense to it until he sniffed. His expression was a mix of surprise, disgust, and embarrassment.

"Sorry," he said. "Didn't realize I smelled that bad."

Link jumped into the water and submerged himself in it. When he came back up, he took his hat off and shook out his hair, little droplets of water flinging out.

"What are you, a dog?!" Vanna said as she backed up.

"Oh, aren't you in for a surprise," Midna said.

Link shot her a look, then looked at Vanna. "Get in. It's real nice." He drank some of the water and hummed in delight. "Tastes good, too."

Vanna scrunched up her face. "Ew! Swimming in it's one thing, but why would you drink it?"

"Um, I'm thirsty?"

"Who knows what's in that water? That's disgusting!"

"Too thirsty to care," he said, taking another big gulp. "Come on and get in."

She walked closer to the edge and peered down into the water. The pool was probably between ten and fifteen feet deep. There was a hole big enough for a person to get through at the bottom of the fence, and just beyond it was a switch on the ground. She guessed that it would raise some platform that would take them up to the strange, flickering blue overhang that led to the lower door.

"I don't know if..." she trailed off.

"What, can't swim?" Link teased, an amused look on his face.

His look faded as he saw hers.

"I-it's not, it's not that I..." Vanna faltered. Her cheeks were as hot as the magma. "I can swim. I just—not underwater. I'm fine on the surface, kinda. But we have to go through that hole," she pointed, "at the bottom of the fence to get to the other side, and I..."

Link looked behind him. "Swim up to the fence, and climb over?" he suggested.

She wasn't good at climbing, either, but at least she knew that it was something she could actually do. "Y-yeah, I can do that."

"Meet you on the other side," Link said.

He dove down, and Vanna watched as he swam deeper and deeper. He came up on the other side of the fence and shook his hair out again, then looked over to her as he put his hat back on. She was still standing in the same place.

"Okay," she whispered to herself.

Rather than jumping in, she lowered herself into the unexpectedly chilled water. She slowly made her way over to the fence and grabbed onto the metal and pulled herself up out of the water. She stopped for a second at the top, her legs straddling either side, thinking about how to maneuver herself and climb down. Her hands gripped the beam on the top of the fence so hard she was sure the rivets would leave dents in her skin. She carefully pulled her left leg over to the other side, then slotted her foot into a hole. She went to move her right foot down.

It slipped. She lost her grip on the top of the fence and went falling backward. She could only let out a short scream before her body was completely under the water.

Vanna flung her arms and kicked her legs up and down as much as she could, trying and failing to get to the surface. Her flailing kept her from closing her mouth or plugging her nose, so when her head finally came up, water was pouring out of them. An arm wrapped around her waist, preventing her from going back down again.

"Are you okay?" Link asked.

She rubbed the water out of her eyes and blinked them open. Link was in front of her, one of his arms floating on the surface of the water, his legs kicking underneath to keep them both up. She spit out what water remained in her mouth and wiped at her nose as she nodded.

"You were really thrashing around," he said. "I thought you were gonna make yourself drown."

She moved his arm off her and pushed away so that she could kick her own legs. "No," Vanna said, though she wasn't sure what she was saying it to—she had been thrashing around, and she'd thought she was going to drown, too. "I can swim, see? I just needed to calm down. I'm sure you would've been scared if you suddenly fell that far down, too."

"So, you're fine now?" he asked. She nodded. "You're not gonna drown?" She nodded again. "Okay, good. Follow me up above the switch over there."

They swam over, and she could tell he was going slower so that she could keep up. Link reached into his pouch once they were stopped above the switch. He brought his iron boots out and slipped them onto his feet, and he started to sink down immediately. Vanna was horrified watching him go down, imagining herself in his spot, though he looked calm as ever.

The ground didn't rise when Link sunk onto the switch, like she thought it would. The door didn't lower either, like her second guess. Instead, a shining ring of blue light erupted from the ground to the overhang of the flickering blue floor above them, and they went flying up to it. Vanna's back hit the floor with a bang, disorienting her, and her whole body felt like it was buzzing with electricity. The water was beneath her—they were upside-down.

Link looked down at her—up at her?—from where he stood upright, and she could tell he was confused and disoriented as well. "How are you sticking?"

"How are you sticking?" she shot back.

"This floor must be magnetic. My boots are sticking. But you..."

But she wasn't wearing iron boots.

Vanna strenuously sat up, feeling like her body was trying to hold her against the magnet. Standing made her even more disoriented as she noticed her wet hair hanging above her head instead of down her back. She looked at her feet when she was all the way up. Like Link's, they were the only thing keeping her from falling down into the water, down where gravity should have made her be.

"Do your boots have metal in them?" Link asked.

"No, they don't. It feels like—like it’s me that’s sticking. Nothing I'm wearing has any—" Vanna stopped herself as she realized that while her whole body felt like it was being tugged down, or up, her shoulder and her back—where her baldric wrapped around her—were being tugged with much more vigor. She was certain the sensation came from her sword attempting and failing to force its way through its sheath on her baldric to meet the magnet. "My sword... I don’t know how, but it must be enough to keep all of me up here with it."

"Better make sure you don't drop it, then, if it's what's keepin' you up here."

She looked up/down at the water and gulped. "Yeah."

Vanna wasted no time walking forward and over the edge of the overhang, and Link followed her lead. Her feelings of being disoriented washed away when they were no longer upside-down. The buzzing feeling washed away too, along with the pull of her sword, as she stepped off the magnetized blue floor onto normal earth.

The lower of the two previously unreachable doors was before them, and their boots squeaked as they walked over to it.

Inside the room was what looked to be another sumo ring, with an elderly Goron standing on the middle of it. He was by far the smallest Goron she'd seen, his narrow eyes even with her belly button, and he held a walking stick in his left hand. Even though he was holding the walking stick and standing in one place, he was still wobbling uncontrollably as he tried to keep his balance. Vanna's eyes flicked back and forth between his long rock beard, and the miniature smoking volcano that was the top of his head.

"Ah... I thought I felt a presence ... but what a surprise to find young humans," the old Goron said in his deep, shaking voice. "Word has come to me of you ... and if Gor Coron has faith in you, then your hearts must be true. I am one of the four Goron elders. Gor Amoto is my name. You are heroic, young humans. Please, you must lend this tribe your power. Take the key shard I've left for you on the table over there, and the map with it."

Vanna looked over to where his eyes did, spotting the key shard he spoke of on a small table. She went over to it and picked up the big blue and gold hunk, and the yellowed map of the mines.

"When merged with the other key shards, you'll be able to get inside the room where our patriarch, Darbus, is being held," Gor Amoto said. "Each of us three elders keeps a piece. You must hurry to the other elders!" He wagged his cane, but quickly put it back down when he nearly toppled over.

She put the key shard in her pouch and looked at the map. It didn't seem like it would be too difficult to get to Darbus. There were only two floors, and they had already been through all of the first one. The second looked a bit more complicated, but she figured the lines on the map would be easier to decipher when they actually got to the rooms they represented, if they even would need the map at all. She folded up the map and put it in her pouch next to the key shard.

She thanked Gor Amoto for the map and the shard, and then climbed up the ladder to the upper half of the room. A clucking noise brought her attention to a collection of pottery, and she saw something poking out of one of the pots.

"Is that...?" Vanna trailed off.

Link's hand twitched toward his pouch, brows together. He didn't say anything, but she knew he was thinking the same thing as her. They'd totally forgotten, or more likely blocked out in her case, that they'd even come across Ooccoo and let her in Link's pouch back in the temple in Faron—so when the hell had she gotten out, and how was she here?

Vanna walked around to the pot and picked it up. Ooccoo fell out of it when she flipped it over. She stood up and shook out her feathers.

She looked just as weird the second time meeting her as she had the first.

"Gracious, you're that nice girl who helped me out the other day! How nice to see you again!" Ooccoo said.

"You... When'd you get out of Link's pouch?" Vanna asked.

"When you two warped out of there, I warped away myself to continue searching for my son—and I found my sweet boy! Here, let me introduce you to him! Ooccoo Jr.?"

The pot next to the one she had been in stirred at the call, and then out came a baby-sized disembodied head with cracked yellow skin, beady pink eyes, and wings where its ears should have been. The wings flapped up and down so fast they blurred as Ooccoo Jr. flew up to Vanna and stared her dead in the face with his creepy blank expression. She heard Link make a quiet exclamation of shock at the sight of him. For once, Vanna was glad she never dreamed, because she was sure that Ooccoo Jr. would feature in her nightmares if she had them.

"He can warp you out of here, and then right back to wherever you left me," Ooccoo said. "Just let me know if you want to warp out—he's a very shy boy, goodness, yes! May we stash away in your pouch, Link?"

Link opened his pouch, and Ooccoo and her son flew into it. Vanna was very happy in that moment that Ooccoo's kind were just as creepy and strange to Link as they were to her.

At least she could look at him and know she wasn't completely alone.

Chapter Text

They left Gor Amoto's room from the highest door, bringing them to the upper level of the room with the water. There was another door across from them, above the one they'd originally come in from. The only way to get to it was to walk sideways along the blue magnetic walls that had pulsing, flaming monsters crawling along them. Link told Vanna they were called Torch Slugs and that they were one of the weakest monsters out there. He put his iron boots back on and they stepped onto the magnet walls, and she let him take care of the things. She was too scared of accidentally dropping her sword and falling down into the water below.

Link and Vanna came back out in the room that had the Dodongo in it, on a ledge they couldn't reach before. Vanna stopped and pulled out the map. Something was wrong.

"Look at the map of the second floor, Link," she said. "We're on it right now, but this room looks nothing like it does on the map. There're all these paths and dead ends and a door on there, but none of it matches up."

Midna came out of her shadow and looked at the map. "It does match up."

"No, it doesn't," Link said. "All there is of the second floor in this room is what we're standin' on right now. It doesn't match up at all. Should we go back to Gor Amoto?"

"No, you two should look up," Midna said.

They looked up at the ceiling. It was shimmering blue, with normal rocks outlining an array of paths. Vanna looked back and forth at the ceiling and the map.

"...It all matches up," she confirmed.

"Exactly like I said. What would you two do without me?"

"We probably would've stepped on that switch over there and found out about the ceiling ourselves," Link said, pointing forward.

"Well, I'm glad we didn't have to find out the hard way that that's one of those activating switches," Vanna said. "At least we can be prepared for it shooting us up to the ceiling now..."

It turned out that knowing ahead of time that it was going to make them fly up to the ceiling didn't make it any more pleasant. Once again, Link's boots allowed him to land on his feet, while Vanna smacked up against the ceiling on her back. It was even worse this time, since the ceiling was so much higher up than the overhang was in the last room. She groaned as she struggled to get to her feet, fighting against the pull of the magnet.

The map quickly became a hundred times more confusing hanging upside-down from the ceiling. She couldn't tell as easily which path lined up with which path on the map like she could when they were viewing them from below. They accidentally took a path that led them down to one of the dead ends first, which was a pretty big setback considering how much ceiling there was and how painfully slow Link's iron boots made him walk. Vanna increasingly felt like each extra second they were up there was an extra year cut off her life with how much stress it put on her. She tried her hardest to pretend that they weren't upside-down, but it was hard to lie to herself when their hair and Link's hat were falling the wrong way.

"...Link?" she said.

"Hm?"

"...How does your hat not fall off when you're upside-down?"

"...I have no idea."

The correct path brought them down to an alcove with a wooden door, that led back outside to the main area of the mines. They followed a metal grated path down to the ginormous base of one of the cranes, and Vanna noticed that the bottom of the cranes were magnetic. She instantly got a bad feeling.

Three Bulblins ran around from the other side of the base, clubs at the ready. Now that she really looked at the green things, she realized that there actually were differences between them and the purple Bokoblins they'd seen in the last temple. The Bulblins had glowing red eyes, they wore a full getup unlike the Bokoblins who simply wore loose pants and shoes, and they didn't look like ugly old man-apes, though they were still ugly. As per his usual, Link took care of them.

They combined their weight on a nearby switch, activating the crane's magnet and making it swivel around. It stopped above three separate docks—one where they'd first come into the main area, another connected to where they were, and another on the other side of the volcano. The magnet deactivated for a few seconds above each dock.

Vanna didn't realize that Midna had come out of her shadow until she heard her say, "Doesn't that look fun?"

It wasn't.

In fact, Vanna would have preferred hiking up Death Mountain five more times over hitching a ride on those cranes. By the time they were dropped off at the final dock, she was wondering how she didn't have irreversible brain damage from being slammed onto the cranes and onto the docks every time.

At least the room they next made it to was another cool room, though the presence of water and gigantic water striders did take some of the sweet relief away from her. The Tektites, as Link called them, hopped on the water on their way over to them. Link ended up killing them all with his sword before diving into the water. He drank the water again, and again she told him off for it—she might have been overly cautious in the last room, but there was no way the water in this room wasn't contaminated from the Tektites. He shrugged it off, and to make a point that he didn't care, he filled up both of his canteens with the water.

Vanna noticed something light in her peripheral vision, and when she searched for what it was, she saw a silver key down at the bottom of the water. "How about you stop drinking that nasty water and go get the key down there?"

Link dove down to get it, and as he did, she started to hop over the stepping stones to get to a large closed gate at the other side of the room. She saw two Bulblins past the gate, guarding spinning metal contraptions that looked like wardrobes.

"Van—oh, there you are," Link said. She looked back to see him swimming over to her. "Good thing you noticed that key. I never could've. We would've been stuck in here forever."

"Maybe you could've if you would wear your glasses," Vanna said. He gave her a confused look, and that's when she remembered that he had never told her he wore glasses. "Um, I saw them in your house," she said before he could ask.

Link climbed out of the water and brought the key up to the gate, only for them both to find out that there was no keyhole. He dropped the key into his pouch and then wedged his fingers into the narrow gap between the sides of the gate so he could try to pull it open himself, but his attempts were in vain. Rather than just watching his pitiful attempts, Vanna looked around the room; there had to be some other way to get the gate open, since there wasn't a door or any other way into the next room. Up on a high ledge, which looked to only be accessible by ascending another magnetized wall, was a blue diamond that looked awfully suspicious.

She knew the diamond had to be their way into the next room, but she wasn't sure what exactly they had to do to it to make it work its magic for them. Maybe they would have to get up to it and push it into the ground. Maybe they would have to open it up somehow.

'Or maybe I can just hit it.'

Vanna's plan worked. The rock she threw at it made the diamond turn yellow, and the gate started to open, making a disgusting grating noise that made her cringe in discomfort. The sound caught the attention of the Bulblins, and they finally noticed Link and Vanna standing there. They screeched as they ran over to attack. Link was quick to take them down.

"Thanks for ... whatever you just did to open up the gate," Link said as he sheathed his sword.

She stayed where she was and surveyed the room. Link proceeded in figuring that the coast was clear, only for one of the spinning wardrobes to stop and shoot a beam of lava at him. He did a backflip to get away from it, and the lava beam stopped.

"How did it know I was standing there?!" Link yelled.

Vanna could barely even think about what he said. "How the hell did you just backflip?!"

Link ran back to her, but he kept his eyes on the wardrobe until he was by her side. "There's gotta be an enemy in there or somethin'," he answered himself. "And—I've always been able to backflip...?"

She stared at him incredulously for a few seconds before she started to think about the wardrobe. "If we were in my world, I'd say it located you by a sensor that automatically went off when you got within a radius of it and then sent a signal to shoot at you, without the help of a living being, but... I guess you could be right about there being an enemy in there, since Hyrule's technology isn't as advanced as my world's," Vanna said. She shrugged. "Is 'magic' an acceptable answer for how it's able to track you down and shoot a beam of lava at you?"

"Beam," Link repeated. "That's what they are. Beamos. They just don't look or act like the ones I've read about. The ones I've read about shot beams of electricity."

She hummed. "I guess your world isn't so primitive after all. ...Even if you guys rely on magic to create high-tech things instead of science."

Since they had nothing that could kill them, they snuck around the Beamos to reach the locked door behind them. The door led back outside, though the area enclosed by the volcano's earthen walls didn't seem to have any magma like the other outside area did. Along with another metal crane, there were wooden towers and ramps, patrolled by Bulblins, that connected to the walls. At once, Vanna saw the Bulblins each pull out something like candles. It wasn't until those 'candles' suddenly shot toward them that she realized what they truly were. An arrow with a flaming broadhead impaled the wood of the deck they were standing on, just yards away from them. Before she had the chance to freak out in fear of the wooden deck catching fire, the small flames of the arrow flickered away.

Link pulled his shield off his back, and held it out in front of him, high enough up so that he could see where to run. Vanna ran behind him, staying leaned over just in case an arrow would manage to fly over his shield. She hurried ahead of him when they neared the door so that she could open it while he continued to guard them from the onslaught of arrows with his shield. She struggled to open the door, and they slipped inside with it barely a fourth of the way open. It rolled back over and closed with a slam.

After making their way across the room over some ramps, they entered the room of the next Goron elder. While the last one they saw was by far the smallest she'd seen, this one was by far the creepiest. His lower lip was dangling off his face, and he looked emaciated. His big blue eyes were sunken in and his cheekbones and ribs were protruding heavily. His appearance got Vanna wondering about Goron's internal anatomy, their eating habits, their lifespans, and all the other intricacies of their beings, so much so that she barely picked up what he said aside from his name until he handed Link a key shard and said something about dangers. She perked up then to listen.

"But there is something that may help you... A weapon said to have been left in this mine by a Hero of old. It is beyond price, so we have protected it through generations. Now, it could aid in our salvation. The Hero's weapon is stored safely up ahead, protected by a guard. Speak to him, and take it with you, with the blessing of the Gorons."

As they were leaving Gor Ebizo's room, Vanna grabbed the new key shard from Link and dropped it into her pouch with the first one. The new room that they went to was another one filled with magma—she could tell before she even stepped in and saw it all. It was a straight shot over to another door, but a Goron that had to be at least fifteen feet tall stood in between the two doors on a giant magnet suspended above the magma by chains that looked much too thin.

"Humans?" the Goron's voice boomed through the room. He stood and rubbed his armored fists together. "What business do humans have coming here? None! No business! This place is forbidden!"

"We just want to get the Hero's weapon!" Vanna said.

Even from a decent distance away, she could see that what she said sparked a flame in his eyes. "I will protect the treasure from you at all costs!"

As the Goron began stomping his way toward them, Link and Vanna shared a glance at each other, and she figured that they were thinking the same thing. The Goron couldn't chase both of them at the same time, and with his weight slowing him down greatly, they could just go around him.

But when they both took off onto the magnet at the same time, Link shouted, "What are you doing?! Go back!"

She ignored Link and continued to run, despite the magnet's pull on her. Vanna was steps away from making it to the other side when the chains holding the magnet snapped. She threw herself forward, just barely able to grab onto the ledge in time. She pulled herself up to safety, heart beating in her chest as fast as it could. She turned back around and looked down, preparing herself for the worst. A sigh escaped her as she saw that the magnet hadn't been completely engulfed by the magma below. Link was fine—ignoring the fact that he was trapped down there with an angry fifteen-foot-tall living rock and he had no way to get back up.

Vanna watched him anxiously from above. The Goron continuously tried to punch Link and failed, and Link continuously tried to stab the Goron and failed. It seemed like the fight was going nowhere when Link finally spotted an opening, and used their technique from earlier to get the Goron to curl up into a ball. Rather than jumping up onto his back to catapult himself up, he grabbed the Goron and threw him down into the magma. The Goron climbed back up onto the magnet, his tremendous weight tilting it so much that Vanna feared it would tip over entirely. If Link hadn't been standing on the other side wearing his iron boots, he would have been plunged directly into the magma.

The magnet stabilized as the Goron got back on the center of it. He didn't try to attack Link again. Vanna guessed that he was talking to Link, but she was too high up to hear what he was saying. The magma began to bubble and rise, the magnet rising with it, until the magnet was back up as high as it had been. Link hopped out of his iron boots and walked her way, looking a lot less pleased than she thought he would be.

"What did he say?" she asked as they began to walk toward the door.

"He said I could have the Hero's weapon as long as I use it to save the patriarch," Link answered, opening his mouth the absolute smallest amount necessary to get his words out.

"Did he break your jaw or something?"

Link lightly shook his head, and Vanna pursed her lips. He opened the door slower than he did all the other times, and they stepped through. It was brighter in the new room, allowing her to see just how red his face was.

"Then what's wrong with your face?" she asked.

He glanced over at her. It wasn't quite like the death glare Malo had given her, but it was close enough to make her worry that she just made him hate her.

"I didn't mean it in a bad way, it's just that you're so red and barely opening your mou—"

"I feel sick," Link quickly interrupted, coming to a halt. He squeezed his eyes shut. "Gimme a minute and just—shh."

Vanna stood there by his side for several awkward seconds before deciding to go ahead and open the treasure chest in the room while waiting. Inside was a wooden and metal bow and a quiver filled with arrows. When she turned back around, items in hand, Link was on his hands and knees at the edge of the ground, vomiting down into the magma. She slowly walked over to him. She couldn't recall a time where she ever watched someone else get sick, or a time where she ever even got sick herself, so she wasn't sure what to do.

"...You okay there?" she asked when it seemed he was done.

He sighed and sat on his legs, his head down and brows furrowed together. "Shhh."

"Do you have a headache or something?" Midna asked in what was probably the loudest not-screaming voice she could muster.

Link's hands flew up to his head. "Yes," he nearly hissed out.

"It'd probably go away if we got out of this heat," Midna said. "So maybe you should just get up and hurry to the last Goron elder."

After a moment, Link nodded and slowly started to get to his feet. Vanna frowned as she noticed him wobble a bit.

"He's sick, Midna," Vanna said.

"He won't be once we're out of here."

"He won't get out of here if he ends up falling into lava because he's too sick to stand up straight!"

"S'fine, Vanna," Link said, words slurring together. "We... We'll jus—just hurry. We're almost done..."

She wanted to say it was painfully obvious he wasn't fine, but there was no point in bothering. It was two against one, even though she could see that Link didn't actually want to side with Midna. He only did because admitting the truth would come with the consequence of her complaining.

He reached his hand out, and it took her a moment to realize that was his way of asking for the bow. She handed both it and the quiver over. Once the quiver was secure around his back, he nocked an arrow and aimed it at a rope holding up a drawbridge. On his first try, the arrow sliced through the rope, and the bridge slammed down loudly. Link's face scrunched up, but as quickly as it did, it fell back to being normal—and his body fell, too.

"Link!" Vanna knelt down beside him on the ground and shook him a few times. "Link, wake up!"

When he didn't move, she shook him even harder, but he still lay there unconscious. She gently smacked his face a few times, and again nothing came of it. Her hands curled up into fists at her sides. She knew he was going to end up having a heat stroke.

"Aww," Midna cooed as she appeared at Vanna's side.

"'Aww,' what?" Vanna snapped.

"You're worried about him!" Midna giggled. "How very sweet of you."

Vanna rolled her eyes. "Of course I am! I know there's no way I can fight that Fyrus guy by myself, and you need that Fused Shadow so you can bring my bracelet back and I can go home, and if Link dies..."

"Do you think he's gonna die?"

Vanna grabbed her phone out of her pouch. "No. I'm not letting him."

She saw Midna hover over her shoulder to look down at her phone in the corner of her eye. "What are you doing?" Midna asked.

Sorry if you're busy but I need help. It's urgent. What do I do if somebody's having a heat stroke, he's unconscious, and I have no access to a hospital or doctor or anything cold?

She sent the text to Zi's mom as fast as she could, ignoring Midna's question. Mrs. Rider was the only doctor Vanna knew and could rely on in a situation like the one she was in. Her eyes flickered back and forth between her phone and Link every few seconds, either to see if Mrs. Rider texted her back yet, or if Link was still breathing.

Bring him to the coolest place you can find, take off any clothes he doesn't need to wear, and fan him off. If you have water, wet his skin.

Vanna read the message aloud for Midna's sake, and as soon as she was done, she yanked off Link's hat and then maneuvered him to get his shirt off. It felt wrong to take an unconscious person's shirt off, but she had to hope he'd prefer his life over modesty, especially after she had already seen him shirtless once before. She wasn't going to bet on him wearing underwear or not, so his pants stayed in place, and she went down to pull his boots off. His feet were littered with blisters from not wearing socks, and Vanna was sure it was for that same reason that his feet somehow managed to stink even more than his armpits.

She poured small amounts of water from her canteen here and there on his body, but she focused most of it on his dry face since his clothes had still been damp in the first place. The only orders she had left to do once she felt his skin was sufficiently wet were to fan him off and bring him to the coolest place she could find. There was no way she could possibly drag Link back to one of the cool rooms with water in it, but even those didn't seem like they would suffice, because they were really only cool in comparison to the infernal heat of all the other rooms. He needed out—but she knew Midna was too heartless to warp him out, and she'd left her TPort at home like an idiot...

"Oh!" she suddenly exclaimed. "Ooccoo!"

Vanna snatched his pouch out from under him and opened it up. Ooccoo and her son flew out, enlarging back to their normal size as they did. It hadn't even been that long since she had last seen them, yet again she found herself stunned by how freaky they were.

"Can your son warp us out of here down to the spring in Kakariko? Please?"

Midna groaned. "Just wait for him to wake up here! Why are you trying to waste time?!"

"Because he might not wake up at all if he stays here! Why are you so apathetic even when Link could die?!" Vanna said. "I don't want him to get out of here to waste time, I want him to get out of here to save his life. I think you're forgetting that if he dies, you're not getting your power back."

Midna hid in Vanna's shadow again with a humph, muttering something under her breath.

"Yes, yes, you can warp out!" Ooccoo said. "You'll return right here, so there are no worries! Just ask him whenever you're ready! Now, bon voyage!"

Before her son got a chance to do anything, Vanna hurried and stuffed Link's discarded clothes into his pouch. Ooccoo Jr. made unintelligible babbling noises as he flew in circles around them, going faster and faster until Vanna's vision went black. Unlike when Midna had used a portal to get them out of the temple in the woods, Ooccoo Jr.'s warping lacked the strange breaking-apart sensation and didn't leave her with weird feeling afterward. What struck her the most was something not the fault of his warping method at all—the plunge in temperature was shocking, even though she was expecting it. They appeared just in front of the spring in the same positions they had been in before. Ooccoo Jr. scurried into Link's pouch that was still open in Vanna's hands, and she sat it to the side.

Remembering how the spring's water healed Beth's arm, Vanna scooped some of it up in her hands and poured it over Link's blistered feet. For just a second, his toes curled up. She moved closer to his head and again lightly smacked his cheeks a few times. His brows drew together, lips slightly parted, and he let out a tiny groan.

"Link, wake up," she softly said.

"Are you kidding me?" Midna said. She came out of her shadow, hovered right over Link's face, and shouted, "Wake up!" at the top of her lungs.

Link's body jolted and his eyes snapped open. Midna retreated to Vanna's shadow, but not until after she gave her a snobby look. Link slowly pushed himself up so he was resting back on his hands. He looked shocked for a second, and then he just looked confused.

"Uh... Where's my shirt and my boots?" he asked. His hand flew up to the back of his head. "And my hat?"

Vanna crossed her arms. "Your dumb ass had a heat stroke because of that stupid hat. I had to take some of your clothes off and get you out of the mines so you wouldn't die. You're welcome."

"Thanks," Link said with a sigh. His eyes narrowed slightly. "...Did you just call my hat stupid again?"

Chapter Text

At Vanna's insistence—and in spite of Midna's resistance—Link agreed to get checked out by Renado before heading back to the mines. Link slowly staggered barefoot along the dirt road that made up Kakariko Village, Vanna's hand hovering over his arm in case he stumbled. She had really wanted to go fetch Renado by herself and bring him back so Link wouldn't have to exert himself, but Link thought it would be better for him to just go along. He said he felt fine, really, it was just that his feet hurt. Vanna kept a watchful eye on him anyway, not trusting him to tell the truth when it came to how bad he felt.

The lobby of the Elde Inn was empty when they entered. She told Link to wait a second while she got Renado, then went upstairs to the hotel's lone room. Colin was sleeping on his bed while Beth, Luda, and Renado looked over him, and Talo was frowning over in his direction from a bed in the corner. Vanna approached Renado and reached up to tap him on his shoulder. Once she had his attention, she asked if he would go downstairs with her to check out Link. He nodded and followed her down to the lobby, where Link had taken a seat on a stool.

"I'm pretty sure he had a heat stroke in the mines," she told Renado. "I just wanna make sure he's okay to head back so we can finish up in there."

Renado questioned Link on how he felt both before his heat stroke and afterward, briefly looked him over, then walked into the kitchen and returned with a bottle of red liquid. Link downed it in seconds. He thanked Renado and handed it back to him without a trace of the medicine left in it.

"It is called Death Mountain for a reason, you know," Renado said. "Humans are not made to be able to survive for long in such extreme conditions. Do not spend more time there than you must."

"So I'm good to go?" Link asked.

Renado nodded. "Just try to take it easy for the rest of today."

"Before we go," Vanna said, looking up at Renado, "will you tell him to keep his hat off?"

"It would certainly be wise to not wear a heat-retaining item of clothing inside a hot volcano."

She gave Link the 'I told you so' look, to which he rolled his eyes back. He reached into his pouch and pulled out the clothes Vanna had taken off of him, sans his hat.

"Should you begin to feel unwell again, listen to what your body is telling you," Renado went on. "If there is nothing stopping you from leaving the volcano when you need to, then do it. Continuing to fight when you need to stop is a sure way to hurt yourself."

Once Renado was upstairs, Vanna paraphrased what he said. "Nothing's stopping you from leaving when you need to. You don't have to keep fighting." It wasn't like she wanted to convince Link to back out—she'd be screwed if he did—but she still wasn't over their little fight from earlier in the day, and Renado's words reminded her of it.

It seemed to take Link a second for what she said to go through. He sighed. "I can't just go back to Ordon whenever I want. I don't know what else I gotta tell you to get that through your head."

"But you can. Even Renado thinks so."

"But. I. Can't." Link slipped his shirt back over his head. "It's my destiny to defend Hyrule. I have to. I fight because I have no choice."

"I don't understand what makes you think you don't have a choice," Vanna said, her words coming out harsher than she intended them to.

"I," Link said, sitting up straight, "am the Hero Chosen by the Goddesses. I can't go against their will."

Vanna rolled her eyes. "Uh huh. And how do you know that you're 'the Hero Chosen by the Goddesses'? Did an angel appear to you in a prophetic dream?"

"A Light Spirit relayed it to me."

She was reminded of the night when Link had told her a Light Spirit had been talking to him, when he'd been staring straight ahead and listening intently, and she'd seen and heard nothing but the rustles of the trees and the trickling water in the spring. She'd genuinely worried that he was schizophrenic or something. It was one thing to believe in their existence, like Midna seemed to, but another to believe they were talking to him personally. "So, how come only you saw and heard that Light Spirit down in Faron? Why didn't it appear to me?"

Link shrugged. "I guess Faron had nothin' to say to you." He paused. "Do you ... not believe in the Light Spirits?"

"No, I don't believe in them. Or your 'Golden Goddesses.'"

He stared at her face blankly, like he was expecting her to crack any second and tell him she was just joking. "...I understand not believing in the Light Spirits—I've heard of some people from Hyrule not believing in them either, since they've never seen or heard from them like you—but everyone knows the Golden Goddesses are real. Maybe you don't believe in them 'cause they didn't create your world, but they definitely created mine."

"Suuure."

"Vanna—"

"Believe whatever you want to," she interrupted him, holding her hands up. "I'll believe in the Light Spirits when I see one. And maybe then I'll consider believing that this world was created by Goddesses who shaped your destiny."

He breathed out a short laugh and shook his head. "No wonder you and Midna clash so much. You're too much alike."

"What?!" Vanna nearly screeched. "I am not anything like her!"

"You're both so ... stubborn. It's ridiculous."

She huffed and crossed her arms. "Well you're a pushover."

"I know," he said under his breath. "I know."

Back in the mines, neither of them said anything.

Vanna felt both better and worse at the same time. There was no resolve from their conversation, but at least there was closure in having it. It left her with an understanding of where Link was coming from, even if she thought it was absurd. She couldn't believe he had the gall to say that she was like Midna, though. She had no problem conceding that they were both stubborn, but that was absolutely it. She had nothing else in common with her.

Even without talking to each other, getting to the last Goron elder was quick. When he handed over the last key shard, Vanna got out the other ones and slotted them all together. She swapped out the completed key for the map as they left the Goron's room. Darbus' location was marked on the map by a drawing of a skull.

Since she had the map and knew where to go, she led the way. Link followed behind her silently, coming forward only to kill the Torch Slugs and flaming bats ahead of them with his newly-acquired bow and to open the door. Once they were through and back outside, they were up on the dock below a magnetic crane they couldn't reach before. The crane dropped them off in front of the room that they'd first seen Beamos in. Once they got through it, they would be back outside where the Bulblins were guarding the ramps, and from there they just had to take a different path to get to Darbus. Vanna started trying to open the door, but it wasn't too long before Link came up beside her and rolled it open with ease. She thought about thanking him—she really was thankful he had opened it, because she admittedly was a weakling and the doors were surprisingly heavy and hard for her to move—but it still felt too soon to say anything to him after their last little skirmish.

Link opened the door leading back outside as well, and then he systematically began to shoot down the Bulblins with the bow and arrows. He didn't miss his targets on the ones that were closer to them, but the farther away they were, the more tries it took. They couldn't move any closer to them though, because already the Bulblin's own arrows were just feet away from hitting them. No matter how many times Link tried, he just couldn't get the last three who were the farthest away from them. When he had run out of his own arrows and had to carefully reach forward and grab some of theirs that had missed them, he was starting to get visibly frustrated. Vanna couldn't stay quiet anymore.

"You can't see them, can you?" she said.

He sighed. "I can kinda see where they are when they have their fire arrows out. Otherwise... No. It's all a blur." Link pursed his lips for a second, then dropped his bow-wielding arm to his side and turned to look at her. "Do you think you could, maybe...?"

Her eyebrows raised. "Uh, there is no way."

"But your vision is good, isn't it? You can see 'em just fine."

"Well, yeah, but, I mean..." she stuttered. "I've never held a bow in my life."

Link held it out to her. "Neither have I before today." Before she could make an assertion of her disbelief, he started speaking again. "I haven't. I mean it." He held the bow out closer toward her. "Just try to do exactly what you saw me doing."

Vanna hesitated before giving in and grabbing the bow. Link handed her an arrow, and she tried to hold the bow and arrow exactly how he had. "Like this?"

"...Good enough. Now just aim and shoot."

She took a few moments to aim, and when she felt it was right, she shot the arrow. It wasn't right, missing the Bulblin she was aiming for by a good twenty feet, but she at least had it in the right direction it needed to be going. She was slightly embarrassed with Link watching her, feeling like he definitely would have gotten it on the first try if he could only see. Vanna nocked another arrow and aimed it much higher, but that time it was too high. She tried again, and again, and again, gradually lowering her aim every time, until she finally hit the Bulblin in the head and it died. She smiled and jumped up and down, loudly proclaiming that she did it, only to settle down when she remembered that Link was still watching her. Embarrassment washed over her again when she looked over to see him looking like he was trying not to laugh.

"Good," Link said, smiling. "Do it again."

It was slightly easier the second time, and slightly easier again the third time, though still quite difficult, but she did it. Her work done, Vanna held the bow out to Link for him to take.

"...You don't like using your sword, do you?" It was a question, but he worded it more like a statement.

She shrugged. "Not really. I know it's probably mostly because I've barely used it, but ... I don't think I'll ever be that comfortable whipping around a giant knife."

"Okay." Link took his quiver off and tried to hand it over to her.

"Link, I—"

"You'll get good, you just need practice. Then I can handle close-distance fighting and you can handle long-distance. Sound good?" he said, nudging the quiver toward her again.

Vanna looked back and forth at the quiver and Link as she contemplated it. A bow did feel more suited to her than a sword—it was lighter, and she could keep a safe distance from enemies with it, too, as Link had said. She would have to work on her aim, obviously, but it was better than nothing.

"Fine," she said, grabbing it and putting it over her shoulder along with the bow.

They started on their way across the ramps, then. At the end of them, Link used his iron boots on a switch to activate what Vanna hoped was the last magnetic crane they'd ever have to use. They hitched a ride on it, bringing them over to a bridge held up by a rope. Vanna managed to shoot and snap the rope, and the bridge slammed down when the magnet dropped them. Feeling slightly disoriented, she checked the map. Once they got through the room past the bridge, which looked short enough, they would be in Darbus' room.

There were a few more Bulblin archers in the next room who were oblivious to their entrance. Vanna decided that it would be good to practice her aim with the bow—her bow—on them. Killing them in fewer tries than the last ones gave her a confidence boost, even though it probably shouldn't have since they were much closer anyway.

The giant door, with its equally giant lock, that would open up into Darbus' room was just past another bridge. Like in the Forest Temple, Vanna had to get up on Link's shoulders to get the key into the lock. Their movements were better coordinated this time, the lock falling and her getting down without a hitch. Her heart started to beat harder in anticipation of what was beyond the door. She couldn't imagine something scarier than Diababa, but video game logic told her that Fyrus would have to be a step beyond it.

They rolled the door open together—though it was debatable how much she truly helped—and entered the room. It was quite dark in there, the only source of light being the magnetic parts of the floor emanating a soft blue glow. In the middle of the room was a gargantuan creature, all black and shadowy like Midna, with his ankles chained to the ground and his arms chained to two of the pillars circling the room. He had some sort of helmet on, but it was hard to distinguish in the darkness.

An orange gem resembling a cat eye on his helmet suddenly lit up, startling Vanna and supplying more light to the room. It was only after that that she realized what she'd thought was a helmet was actually his head. Two beady eyes glowed along with the gem, and the extra light allowed her to see that he had giant fangs protruding from his mouth. He hunched over so his head was as close to them as possible and roared like a bear, his smoldering breath blowing against them like a strong gust of wind. He stood up and looked at his cuffed wrists. He threw his head back, let out another roar, and his body erupted into flames. With staggering ease, he yanked his hands forward and broke the chains, freeing himself.

As Fyrus began to stomp toward them, Vanna readied her bow. She remembered how Diababa had an eyeball inside its mouth that Link had attacked to kill it, and figured that the gem on Fyrus' forehead was essentially his version of that. She missed once, then decided to give herself one more try before booking it to the other side of the room to avoid being stomped on. The arrow collided with the gem on her second try. Fyrus roared in pain, stopping in his tracks and holding his hands over the gem. She was clueless about what to do next. She couldn't shoot him in the gem again with his hands covering it, and there was no way Link could get close enough to his flaming body to stab him.

Link grabbed her arm and ran with her behind Fyrus. He put his iron boots on and grabbed one of the chains attached to Fyrus' foot. Vanna wondered why Link had brought her around with him—surely he knew that she wouldn't be of much help to him when it came to pulling the chain if that was what he wanted—but his decision made sense when Fyrus tried to walk forward again only to promptly fall over right where they had been standing because of Link pulling at his ankle. The flames covering his body dwindled upon his impact with the ground.

Already Vanna knew how the rest of the fight was going to go. Link ran over to Fyrus' head to attack his weak spot while she backed herself up against the wall and readied her bow again. Link ran to her when Fyrus stood back up. The monster became engulfed in flames once more, and turned to face them. She shot him in the gem again, and as she ran around him with Link again, all she could think was that this had to be the easiest boss fight. As long as she was quick enough in hitting his gem each time he rose, Fyrus wouldn't be able to do anything. More than likely there would be one more round, and then the fight would be theirs, and they would walk out unscathed.

And naturally, she had to be proven wrong immediately after thinking that. Fyrus stood up and turned to Vanna the second time much quicker than anticipated, and before she could even loose her arrow, Fyrus swung one of his chains like a whip against her, and she flew back into the wall. She slid down and slumped against the wall, throwing her arm over where the chain hit her on her ribs. Her bow had fallen out of her hand, and with Fyrus getting closer to her every second, she knew she didn't have time to go forward and get it. She scrambled away along the wall, hoping she could circle back around to it.

Too caught up by her own movements and the throbbing pain in her ribs and back, Vanna didn't realize that Link had managed to get her bow until he ran over to her with it in his hand. He grabbed an arrow from the quiver, and when Fyrus noticed where they were and started to come over, Link shot his gem. She moved out of the way so that Fyrus wouldn't fall on her when Link tripped him. Fyrus only took a few more slashes from Link's sword before writhing and screaming in the pain of his defeat. His body turned back into a shadow before tiny black squares exploded out of him. A smaller, but still large shadow was in his place, and it fell to the ground as the black squares all came together above Link and formed the second Fused Shadow.

Midna came out of Vanna's shadow and floated over to it. "Well done! Now we have two Fused Shadows..." She grabbed it with her hand-hair, and it disappeared behind her back. Vanna slowly walked over to stand next to Link. "You know, you two have been very helpful so far, so as a reward, I'll tell you an interesting story."

Vanna sighed. They were still inside a volcano, and Midna thought it was a good time to tell them a story.

"Zant," she spat. "That's the name of the King of Darkness who cast this pall of shadows over this world. He's very strong. Both of you together would still be nothing against him in your current states... But Zant will never be my king! I have nothing but scorn for his supposed strength. Not that Zelda is much better... It still appalls me that this world of light is controlled by that princess. A carefree youth, a life of luxury... How does that teach duty?" Midna turned away from both of them. "...But I guess I shouldn't begrudge her the circumstances of her life. She didn't choose it, after all. And I would never wish harm on her... No, as long as I can get my hands on the Fused Shadows, I'll be just fine."

"Are you done monologuing yet?" Vanna asked.

"Yes, I'm done," Midna said. With a flick of her wrist, a portal appeared on the ground. "There's only one more Fused Shadow left... Shall we?"

One more. Just one more, and she could go home.

A deep groan brought Vanna out of her daydream about going home. The large shadow had gradually lightened during Midna's monologue, and was back in the form of the Goron who had been corrupted by the Fused Shadow. Vanna was relieved Darbus didn't have to die after all.

Link and Vanna walked onto the portal, and Midna warped them out. The feeling of breaking up into tiny little slices was still jarring to Vanna, and again she felt weird when she was all put back together. They appeared back in the spring at the end of Kakariko Village. Like the first time Midna had warped them to a spring, Link stared straight forward, apparently listening to the words of the Light Spirit that lived in the spring. Vanna still didn't see or hear anything. Link's eyebrows raised, and then the corners of his mouth slightly turned up.

"What'd it say to you?" she asked him.

"Ilia is in Lanayru," Link said.

Vanna had almost forgotten about his girlfriend. "So, I bet you wanna hurry up and go find her even though Renado told you to take it easy, huh?"

"I know I should take it easy, but something could happen to her. I need to find her as quick as I can."

"Well then, let's go get rid of the twilight in Lanayru so you can find her," Midna said. "Vanna, you'll have to stay behind again."

She nodded and looked at Link. "I know you wanna spend time with your girlfriend, but maybe don't take too long this time...?"

Link's eyes widened and his cheeks reddened. "What? Ilia's not my girlfriend. I never even had one..."

Vanna raised her eyebrows. It was hard to believe that someone as attractive as him had managed to go seventeen years single. "Really? Midna told me Ilia was your girlfriend."

Midna snickered. "He's denying it."

"I'm not denying anything," Link said. He sounded like he was definitely denying something. "Ilia's the only girl in my village that's around the same age as me, so I guess Midna assumed she's my girlfriend 'cause of that, but she's not. She's my friend. That's all."

'Good,' Vanna thought. Immediately, she was ashamed of how happy it made her to know they weren't together, despite it seeming like he wanted to be with her. She knew several girls back home who liked Zi and were jealous of her simply for being his best friend, and she always thought they were being ridiculous, but there she was being just as ridiculous as them. She couldn't help it though. Link was just one of those people, impossible to not be attracted to, pushover or not.

"Oh," she said. "People always assume I'm dating my friend, too. Or, well, they did, before I came here. But..." She couldn't help the little smile that crept up on her face. One more Fused Shadow, and then she could go back home and be annoyed at all of Zi's little fangirls. She had never been more excited at the prospect of being annoyed. "I guess you should be going then."

Link nodded, and Midna hopped into his shadow. "I wanna go see Colin real quick first, and I think it's your turn to get checked out by Renado."

As they started to walk to the Elde Inn, Vanna's hand went to her ribs. She didn't feel any breaks or fractures, and most of the pain had subsided already. It only hurt a little when she pressed down on them. She wondered if just standing in the miracle water of the spring for that short amount of time helped to heal her, regardless of the fact that the water didn't even come in contact with her skin. Along their walk, Vanna continuously pressed down on her ribs again and again, seeing if the lingering pain would wear off as quickly as the rest of it had.

Link's demeanor changed when they got to the Elde Inn's deck, and as far as Vanna could tell, for no reason. He suddenly looked plagued with worry, and he raced inside, leaving her behind. He was already over halfway up the stairs by the time she stepped in. She stopped just in front of the door.

She didn't have to follow Link upstairs to know what had happened. The crying she heard was enough.

Chapter Text

Vanna couldn't just stand there in the Elde Inn and listen to the kids crying upstairs, so she left. Part of her wanted to be there with them and try to comfort them, but the idea of comforting grieving people that she barely knew seemed kind of weird, even if well-intentioned.

She didn't know what to do. For about a minute, she just stood there on the deck, tapping her fingers on the railing as she finally took the time to thoroughly scan the village from end to end in the daylight. There wasn't exactly much to look at. Most of the run-down wooden houses were boarded up, giving Vanna the feeling that Renado and Luda were the only people who had lived in the village for some time. Near the northern end of the village was one of the few buildings not boarded up, and in front of it was a sign. Some of the letters on it were close enough to their English counterparts that she had no problem telling that it at least said Bomb Shop—though the painting of a bomb right below it might have helped a touch—but the word above it just looked like BHphes to her. She had already figured out what most of those letters really were, but she was unable to figure out what the p in the middle was, leaving her with Bapnes which she was sure couldn't be right.

A bomb shop seemed oddly out of place with Renado in mind. Vanna had only met him the day before, and she only had very few interactions with him, but he didn't seem to be the kind of man who would approve of the usage of bombs, especially in his village. She thought that physical violence could only be a last resort for a healer like him, if a resort at all. Her curiosity piqued, she made her way over to the building and knocked on its metal door a few times. It was faint, but she heard a voice call "Come in!"

When she first entered, she didn't see anyone. She only saw a wooden counter, metal stairs to the side of it, and a lot of metal contraptions and pipes lining the underside of the second floor. Vanna walked up the stairs to see a man packing a black powdery substance into a bag. Considering Renado and Luda's Native-esque appearance, the man's cowboy-esque apparel made him seem eccentric and almost out of place living in the same town as them. Like them, at least, it was easy to imagine him as a person from America, albeit from a long time in the past.

"Rena—oh," his voice fell as he turned his head to her. He pushed up his welding helmet. "You ain't Renado. You a customer?" He had a strong Southern accent, and that fact in conjunction with his rounded ears led Vanna to speculate that he was perhaps from Ordon.

"Uh, I don't have any money, so, no," she answered.

"Well, good, 'cause I ain't got nothin' to sell you." He flipped his helmet back down and got back to work. "I can't get the materials I need from the Gorons anymore, so I can't finish makin' more bombs. If they'd just knock off this li'l hissy fit they've been throwing lately..."

"I think they're about done with their 'hissy fit,' or they should be soon enough. They were having a little problem with their patriarch," Vanna said, unsure of how much the man knew about what had happened with the Gorons in the first place, "but I think he's all better now. I just saw him."

He stopped his work and looked back at her. "You talked to 'em?" After she nodded, the man stood and removed his helmet, and sat it on a desk. "Looks like I'm headin' up the mountain, then! If you get your hands on any money, feel free to stop back by soon. I should have my shop reopened in a few days."

"Before I go—what's the name of this place?" she asked. She wanted to unravel the Bapnes mystery, hoping that it would help her be able to decode any other written things that she might come across.

"Barnes' Bomb Shop. I've got a sign just outside, y'know. Look for it if you come back," he said as he started to pick up tools and put them inside a magic pouch.

"Will do," Vanna said with a nod, knowing it would be better to pretend she just hadn't seen the sign. She mentally took note that p's were r's, adding to what knowledge she had of Hyrule's writing system.

Once she was outside of the shop, she settled on heading to the store on the other side of town that Malo had gone to earlier in the morning, hoping there would be someone else in there, too. Unfortunately, nobody was in the tiny shop. Displayed on a shelf behind the counter were only three items—a shield that looked very similar in design to the one from Link's basement, a red flagon, and a metal mask in the shape of a hawk's face. Vanna climbed over the counter, picked up the strange mask, and flipped it over to inspect it. The back side of it resembled a pair of binoculars, and when she held it up to her face, she realized that was precisely what it was. An unintentional movement of her finger on a scroll wheel on the side of the mask caused the binoculars to zoom in farther. Testing it out, she found that it could zoom in so far that she could see each and every tiny scratch and crack on the wooden floor as if her eyes were right in front of them. They would have been really helpful in the mines when Link was having trouble seeing to shoot the Bulblins.

Vanna put the binoculars back down and picked up the flagon. Something sloshed around inside of it as she moved it, but it felt too thick to be a regular beverage. She opened the top and peeked in. There was red liquid inside; she wondered if it was the same stuff that Renado had given Link to drink. She tried to sniff it, and the hint of a medicinal smell was overpowered by a completely repugnant smell, like sulfur and fire and heat. Though she wasn't a stranger to high temperatures by any means, with New Jersey being in the high 90s and low 100s all throughout the summer, it wasn't until now that she realized that heat had its own distinct smell that wasn't just the odor of a city packed with millions of sweaty people.

And it took her a second to realize that the awful smell wasn't the medicine. It was her.

She couldn't stand having to stink for however many more days until Midna would bring back NEVA, but just taking a bath wouldn't be enough to rid her of the volcano's stench. Her clothes smelled even stronger than her body, and they would only continue to make her stink if they weren't washed as well. The only clothing she had that would be at least slightly acceptable to wear was her crop top since she hadn't worn that around in the volcano, but she obviously couldn't walk around wearing just that.

She searched through the crates in the shop, hoping that the village's only store that wasn't for bombs would have some clothes in stock, but there were only odds and ends littering the boxes. She left the store with a disgruntled sigh, weighing her options. There really wasn’t anyone around she could borrow clothes from. She wished she would've thought ahead before they'd left Ordon and asked to borrow more of Uli's clothes from before she got pregnant.

Her eyes fixated on one of the houses on the opposite side of the street that wasn't boarded up, then trailed over to the spring. Beyond the shallow waters and the short little waterfall was a large pool of water that, while enclosed by earthen walls on the sides, offered little privacy from the street. However, it was at least far enough back that someone would have to be in the shallows of the spring to really get a good look at anyone back in the pool. Vanna knew that Link and the kids were mourning Colin inside the inn, Renado and Luda were surely giving comfort to them, and Barnes was making his way up the mountain, but she still was nervous about being caught back there.

Ultimately she decided that she smelled too bad to care about there being a fraction of a chance that people she'd never see again would potentially see her taking a bath. She decided to check first and make sure the house she was planning on going into wasn't occupied, and it wasn't. All that was in there was a bed, a disappointingly empty wardrobe, some boxes, and a full-length mirror cracked diagonally propped up against the wall. Knowing that it was going to start to get cold soon, she headed for the spring so that she could get at least somewhat dry before it did.

Once she climbed up the waterfall, Vanna went over to one of the walls where she could stand in the water. She put her bow and quiver in her pouch, and pulled out her crop top so she could wash that as well. She kept a look out for anyone possibly coming out of the buildings as she quickly stripped the rest of her clothes off, and then she hurried into the deeper water, leaving her clothes to soak in the shallow.

She wasn't sure if anything she did could really be considered 'washing,' what with the fact that she had no soap, but she hoped that the spring's healing water could double as cleansing water. Vanna repeatedly ran her hands through her hair and used her top as a rag on her skin until she couldn't smell herself anymore, then attempted to wash her clothes by scrubbing them together. When she was as satisfied as she thought possible, she got back up near the wall, wrung out her hair and clothes, and then slipped everything back on for her walk to the house.

An out-of-nowhere thought made Vanna stop walking abruptly just past the waterfall—maybe it wasn't implausible for Light Spirits and Goddesses to exist.

Hyrule was real when it shouldn't have been. Link was real when he shouldn't have been. Magic was real when it shouldn't have been. It truthfully wasn't much of a leap in logic to believe in Light Spirits and Goddesses, not after she saw how a hunk of glowing stone could turn a giant man made of rocks into a humongous flaming monstrosity. She wasn't sure what sparked a change in her steadfastness, but she thought it had to be something in the water.

She turned back around to the waterfall. "Hey, Light Spirit?" she whispered. "Light Spirit, are you there?"

Nothing. Her belief in their nonexistence started to solidify again.

With a sigh, she turned back and headed for the house. As soon as she was inside, she locked the door behind her. She took her clothes back off and hung them in the closet to dry. Like when she'd gotten to explore Ordon by herself, she felt an exhilarating rush from being alone as she walked the street of Kakariko Village and entered the house all by herself, but it all came crashing down on her suddenly as she sat on the edge of the bed. It was easy to forget how dreadfully homesick and lonely she was in this world when she had something to concentrate on, even if it was something as simple as where she was walking.

She couldn't handle it. Vanna snatched her phone out of her pouch and called her mom, wishing desperately that the call would go through. She impatiently tapped her fingers on the side of the bed as her phone rung.

"Hello?"

There was a knock at the door. "Vanna, are you in there?"

She pulled her phone away from her face. "Yes, just a second!" She lifted her phone back up to her ear. "Hey, I gotta go now. I'll call you back tomorrow, okay?"

"Okay, sweetheart, I'll talk to you then. Goodbye!" her mom said.

Vanna said goodbye back, hung up her phone, and went over to the closet. Her clothes were damp and cold, but she sucked it up and put them on anyway. When she opened up the door, Luda was standing there, and it was decently dark outside behind her. The nearly-night sky made her aware of just how dark it had gotten in the house while she was distracted by her conversation with her mom.

Luda's eyebrows drew together. "Oh, my, you're all wet!"

"I needed a bath and didn't have an extra set of clothes or anything to dry off with, so..." Vanna shrugged.

"I could give you some dry clothes to wear," Luda said. "Another family used to live here, but just this last week..." Her face fell. "...They had a daughter about your size. You can have her clothes, if you'd like."

Dead girl's dry clothes or her damp clothes? A sudden shiver made her decision for her. "Th-that would be nice, yeah."

Luda gave a little smile. "Okay. We've finally got around to making dinner at the inn. Would you like to come over and eat after we get your clothes?"

Vanna accepted her offer, and then she led her over to another house. Luda left the door open so more light could spill inside. The interior looked quite similar to the house Vanna had been in, but with two extra beds and one extra wardrobe.

"They were originally from Castle Town," Luda said as she began to sift through the clothes in one of the wardrobes. "Castle Town fashion is ... quite strange, or at least it is to me. I'll get something simple for you, without all the unnecessary layers and accessories they like."

What she settled on was fairly simple, like she said: a belt, a long-sleeved knee-length dress, an overshirt of sorts with flowing sleeves and a draping bottom, and lastly a simple bra and pair of short bloomers. Vanna thought the dress and overshirt looked tacky with their frills and lace hems, and she wasn't too sure how she felt about wearing a stranger's antiquated underwear, but it would be better than wearing wet freezing clothes or having to go commando in a dress.

"This dress will make a nice nightgown, as well," Luda said, laying the clothes down on the bed. She looked at Vanna, her eyes going higher up than Vanna's own at first, and then down her body. "Your hair still looks really wet. Do you want me to put it up for you so you don't get your new clothes wet?"

"You don't have to—it's nice enough that you helped me out with the clothes and came and got me for dinner already, and the dinner might get cold soon if we wait around much longer..."

"It's above the fire, it won't get cold." Luda clasped her hands in front of her chest and grinned. "Please? I really like doing hair, and I'm really quick at it, too!"

"If you don't mind, then sure," Vanna said. It definitely would be nice to not have to worry about her hair making her new clothes just as cold and wet as her other clothes.

Luda patted the bed next to the clothes, and Vanna sat down on it with her back facing her. She got to work, her delicate fingers making a French braid faster than Vanna imagined even her mother could, and then she wound up the length into a bun just above the nape of her neck. Grabbing some sort of fasteners from the nearest nightstand that Vanna couldn't see, Luda pushed them into her hair to keep it in place.

"All finished!" she announced. "I'll leave you to get dressed, now. Come to the inn when you're done!"

Vanna thanked her, and she left her in the house with the door still opened just a speck for light. She changed into the new outfit, making sure to flip the bloomers inside out first at least, and she left her boots on and swapped her pouch over to the new belt. Everything fit a lot better than she expected it would, but she felt strange walking outside. She wasn't familiar with the feeling of bloomers or a long dress brushing against her legs. There were a few times on her walk to the inn that she spun around in a circle just to feel how the fabric swooshed around her.

Just inside the Elde Inn, Link, Renado, and Luda were sitting at a round table, and Renado was talking to Link. There was a plate of food on the table between Luda and Link's seats. Luda was eating her dinner, Renado's plate was already empty, and Link was poking at his food pointlessly.

"I got a plate for you," Luda said as she noticed Vanna enter.

She sat down in front of the plate and thanked Luda once more, and then she looked at Link. He looked awful, his downcast eyes completely bloodshot and face stuck in a pained frown. It was hard to believe that just hours ago he had been holding back laughter from seeing her excitement over hitting her target with an arrow for the first time.

As Vanna started eating, Renado resumed talking to Link. "You should eat your food. You will sleep better tonight with a full stomach, and a good rest will make your journey to Castle Town tomorrow much more bearable."

Link sealed his lips tighter, but otherwise gave no indication that he had even heard what Renado said. No one said anything more as Luda and Vanna ate their dinners. Once their utensils were set down, everything fell into an uncomfortable complete silence for minutes before Link shot up off his stool and walked outside.

Without thinking about it, Vanna stood up and followed him out. His brisk pace had already led him to Epona by the time she was out the door. She ran up to him as he was preparing to mount his horse.

"What are you doing?" Vanna said.

Midna came out of his shadow. "Renado told him that he could get a wagon in Castle Town to bring everyone down to Ordon to hold a funeral for Colin."

"So you're leaving right now? At night?" Vanna asked Link.

He glanced her way briefly before getting up on Epona. Midna shrugged and went back into the shadows, and Link started on his way.

"Wait!" she called.

Epona slowed to a stop. Again, Vanna ran to Link, this time reaching into her pouch and fetching her bow and quiver as she did. She held them up to him.

"You might need them," she said.

He seemed to ponder if he should take them or not before taking them anyway without a word and putting them in his own pouch. With a quick noise and a light kick on both of Epona's sides, Link's horse began to lead him away once more. Vanna watched them until they disappeared, and continued to stand where she was for a while before slowly starting to head back to the Elde Inn. She stopped as she got to the small set of stairs to the porch, and looked behind her, at the spring.

There had to have been something in the water, because she felt like the spring was calling to her, and she couldn't ignore it. Vanna walked to the spring and didn't stop until the water was halfway up her boots.

"I want to see you if you're real, just for a second. You don't even have to talk to me," she whispered.

Nothing again. It was definitely something in the water.

"Please?"

"They say only the brave can see them," said a tiny voice behind her.

Vanna jumped; she hadn't heard anyone come up behind her. It was one of the children, she knew, but she didn't think she had talked to any of them long enough to be able to differentiate their voices for certain without looking at them. Her first thought was that the quiet voice belonged to Colin, even though she knew it couldn't be him. She looked back to see which one it was.

Maybe it really wasn't too implausible for Light Spirits to exist when a glowing apparition of Colin was floating behind her in the spring.

"...That's what my dad told me when I couldn't see Light Spirit Ordona," he said.

She couldn't get herself to talk at first, and when she did, all she could say was, "You're dead."

He technically wasn't the first ghost she had ever seen, but there was a difference between Colin and the Hero's Shade that made Vanna feel like she was really seeing one for the first time. She had never seen the Hero's Shade alive, only dead, and only in a mystical snowy realm in her subconscious that was disconnected from the real world, and now she was completely conscious, completely in the real world, staring at the ghost of a child she had seen breathing this morning.

"I know," Colin replied, looking down at his feet. He folded his arms behind his back. "But I can't pass on yet."

"You ... have passed on, already," Vanna said slowly, confused.

"I've passed from life. I haven't passed from this world."

She didn't know what to say. She could only stare at his floating blue form silently.

"I can't, yet," he went on. He looked back up at her. "I need to know before I go... Can you promise me something?"

Weakly, she nodded her head.

"Take care of Link," Colin said quietly. "And make sure everyone ... especially him ... and especially my parents ... know how much I love them."

Vanna's mouth fell open, and she struggled to find the words she wanted to say. "Li-Link will be back soon, can't you hang on just a little bit longer to see him? And he's going to go get your parents, so you can see them one last time, too. Don't you want to say goodbye?"

"It'll just hurt them more to see me this way... They'll be hurt enough when they find out what happened. And if I have to see my parents cry over me..." Colin's eyes closed and his head turned down. "I can't do it. I can't."

"Then—then you don't have to," she said. "I'll ... let them know, okay?"

Colin nodded and raised his head. "But what about Link? Do you promise to stay with him and help him?"

"I promise." She felt horrible having to lie to the kid, but there was no way she was going to stick around and go through however many more temples and life-threatening situations that were waiting for Link. Midna would bring back NEVA after the next temple, and then she was going to go home and leave her and Link to it.

"Good," Colin said with a smile. "He's really going to need you."

If he was trying to make her feel worse, he was succeeding. "I know..."

He sighed contentedly. "I'm ready to go, now. Please don't forget what you promised me."

Colin closed his eyes, and he disappeared into the wind.

Chapter Text

For the few days after Link left, Vanna didn't have much to do at all. The first day she mostly spent talking to Zi on the phone, and she occasionally tried and failed to get her mom to respond back to her. In the evening Luda offered to teach her the Hylian alphabet, and Vanna gladly agreed to take her lesson. At night time she walked back and forth on the street, finally stopping at the spring to try to get the Light Spirit to talk to her again before giving up and going back to the little shack she had claimed. She checked her phone one last time before lying down to sleep, and saw that her mom had finally responded.

Jaylene went into labor early. Say hello to Gabriel Matthew Holt! 5lbs 2oz

She should have been happy to see the text and the picture of her nephew and sister that came with it, but she wasn't. She was just upset that she missed out on being there the day of his birth, that she wouldn't be able to hold him for however many days it would be until they got that last Fused Shadow. The extra pictures that her mom sent of her and Vanna's other sister Kalina and her fiancée Ami taking turns holding him only helped to make her more jealous that they all got to be there and she didn't.

She had trouble sleeping that night, both because she was too antsy for Link to just come back already so they could get going and she could get home, and because she couldn't stop seeing the image of Colin's ghost in her head.

The Ordonian children were at least somewhat better on the second and third days. Malo, it seemed, had already cried out all of his tears, though Vanna figured it was just because the four-year-old didn't understand the finality of Colin's death. Beth was handling it the worst, understandably. Colin had died because he'd saved her, and it was hard for her to not see it as her own fault in a grieving state.

Vanna tried to keep their minds occupied by telling them stories about some things from her world—about the teleporters like Mr. Rider's TPorts and NEVA, and his Synthumans and the different kinds of them like the Incubots, and the spacebuses that took you to the moon or other planets and the cars that only existed now for fun, and then the gadgets like her hearing aids and phone. They listened to some of the music she had on her phone together, but they didn't seem interested in the music itself as much as the fact that it was coming out of a glowing little slab.

After the kids went to bed that night, Vanna went back outside by herself, back to the spring. During the time she hadn't been able to sleep the night before, she'd spent plenty of time thinking about what Colin had said. 'Only the brave can see them.'

"I'm brave, aren't I?"

She'd fought monsters. She'd fought a chain-whipping fire monster the size of a house. A coward wouldn't do that, would they? A coward wouldn't have even left Ordon.

So what made Link more brave than her? She did all the same things he did, with the exception of when he had to go into the twilight, and that was only because she couldn't follow him without 'turning into a spirit,' whatever exactly that was supposed to entail.

Vanna voiced her thoughts to the Light Spirit, but if her words reached it, it didn't care to respond. If it was real, then she was convinced it had to be purposefully trying to rile her up by ignoring her—and if she wasn't before, she was officially dead set on seeing it if it was the last thing she did.

Just as she was beginning to head back to the shack to go to bed, she heard something in the distance. She stood still and listened. It sounded like the trot of multiple horses, but there was also some other squeaking sort of sound with it that she had never heard before and couldn't place. The sounds got closer and closer.

They were coming into the village.

She was about to run for her life into the Elde Inn, thinking that it had to be more Bulblins riding on their Bullbos, but then she saw that it wasn't. It was two horses being ridden by two people who were still unidentifiable, and the sound she couldn't place was the noise made by the wooden wheels of a wagon that was rolling along behind the horse in the back.

When they got closer, Vanna could see that the horse and its rider at the front were Epona and Link, and behind them was a black horse being ridden by a sizable woman—Ilia, perhaps, she thought, taking into account her portly father—who she couldn't get a good look at with the lack of lighting near the village entrance. She walked up next to Link and Epona, and trailed beside them as they came farther into the village.

"Hey, Link," she said.

He peered down at her and gave her a short nod, but said nothing, and then returned his focus to the road ahead. He looked like he was in an even worse mood than he was when he'd left, somehow. All Vanna knew that he had set out to do was get rid of the twilight in Lanayru, find Ilia, and get a wagon to bring the kids down to Ordon for the funeral. She didn't think that getting the wagon could have been much of an issue, and she was sure he had gotten rid of the twilight in other areas without trouble, so she wondered if Ilia was the problem. Maybe the woman on the horse behind him wasn't Ilia, and he hadn't found her in Lanayru as he'd hoped to.

Link stopped and got off Epona in front of the Elde Inn, and Vanna came to a stop on its porch to wait for him. He walked behind to the back of the woman's wagon as she dismounted. The woman joined her on the porch, and with the firelight from the sconces next to the Elde Inn's doors, Vanna got a better look at her. After managing to tear her eyes away from the woman's chest, she was certain she wasn't Ilia. She had to be somewhere in her thirties, and she was a Hylian like Link, not a normal human like the rest of the people from Ordon. Even if she was young and round-eared she wouldn't have looked like Bo's daughter, though, with her light brown skin and cornrowed red hair. She also wouldn't have been that tall in America, but Vanna thought she had to be quite tall in Hyrule, and she was still much taller than her. Vanna's face was nearly level with her cleavage, which only made it harder for her to not stare.

"Hello, young miss," the woman said. Vanna was surprised by her English accent. She'd never thought it was too weird that Renado and Luda had general American accents while Barnes and the Ordonians sounded Southern, despite the relatively close proximity of Kakariko and Ordon, but it struck her as particularly odd that there were people who had a third, completely different accent in just one small country.

Though she had a warm smile on her face, something about standing next to her was ... intimidating.

"Hello," Vanna said back quietly.

She looked behind her, where a girl stepped out of the wagon, and then out came Link. At first Vanna thought he was holding a child wearing strange purple and white clothes in his arms, but then she realized it wasn't clothes that made the child purple and white. The child had purple and white skin if it could be called that, and fins, and gills, and flippers for feet, and a head that pointed up in the back like a fishtail. It was a fish person. Link had told her of fish people in the mines—Zoras, she remembered they were called—but having previous knowledge of their existence didn't make it any less weird to see one in real life.

Vanna opened up the left door as Link approached, and the woman held open the right for him to have more room to get through. Link walked in with the girl to his right side, obstructing Vanna's view of who she now presumed to be Ilia. The woman and Vanna let themselves in after them, and Link led the way upstairs to Renado. Beth, Talo, Malo, and Luda were all asleep on beds on one side of the room, so Renado ushered them over to the other end so as to hopefully not disturb them.

"What happened?" Renado asked in a hushed voice as he took the Zora child from Link's arms.

"I found him passed out on the road in Castle Town," the girl responded. She had a Southern drawl, and Vanna could see that she had round ears from where she stood behind her—she had to be Ilia.

"I tried to get a doctor to save him, but he said he couldn't help Zoras," the woman said. "I'd heard of you before, and I knew you had to be our only hope."

"I am glad word of me reached you, in that case. I will do everything I can to save him," Renado said.

"And..." the woman looked down at Ilia. "She's lost her memory—can't even remember her own name. Could you help her, too?"

That explained Link's mood. If Ilia couldn't even remember what her name was, then she more than likely couldn't remember him, either.

Renado nodded. "I will try, but please let me care for the boy first. It would be much appreciated if you would step out, perhaps to the lobby, so I can have some space. I will come see you once I have done everything I can for him."

They left Renado with the boy—who Vanna would never have guessed was a boy, given his lack of clothing and lack of anything that would normally let you know when someone's a boy—and went back to the lobby, and it was down there that she finally got to face Ilia. Her green eyes were set wide apart on her face and her nose was very upturned. While she wasn't Vanna's type, she supposed she could see how Link could find her to be attractive ... if she was the only girl around his age that he knew up until now ... and she was. Of course he would think she was pretty. Of course he would settle for someone that looked like her if he'd never known anything else, anything better.

...Had she always been such a jealous bitch?

Vanna was taken aback by her own cruel thoughts. Ilia had saved the Zora boy, and even though Vanna admittedly didn't know Link all that well, she knew Ilia had to be a nice girl if he liked her. It wasn't like it even mattered, anyway; she was going to go home soon and never see anyone from Hyrule ever again.

'Still,' the unjustifiably envious part of her said, 'she's not even that cute.'

They sat around a table, and the woman spoke up when they did. "I can't stop wondering why that Zora boy was in Castle Town by himself. They normally stay up by their domain or in Lake Hylia."

Link pursed his lips, then slowly opened them to speak, keeping his eyes on his folded hands. "I know why," he said. "...Zora's Domain was raided by beasts, so the Queen sent him to Hyrule Castle to let Princess Zelda know. That little boy is the Prince of the Zora, Ralis."

"That was him? The Queen must be worried sick..." the woman said.

"Actually... After he left, she..." Link gulped. "The beasts killed her."

Ilia gasped and held a hand over her heart. "That's awful! Oh, Ralis is going to be crushed when he recovers... What about the King? Is he okay?"

"The King's been dead for a few years, now," the woman answered, though the question was directed at Link. "I remember hearing of Princess Zelda traveling up to Zora's Domain to extend her condolences to the Queen and Prince. She'd just recently been orphaned after losing her own mother, so it was the talk of the town. Looks like she's got a lot in common with Prince Ralis, now, both losing their parents young and having to rule their people alone..."

"How old is Princess Zelda?" Vanna asked. At the look she got from the woman that seemed to say 'How don't you know?' she tacked on, "I'm not from Hyrule."

"Ah, right—Ordonian, aren't you? Princess Zelda just celebrated her twentieth this year."

She didn't particularly care about correcting her, not when she knew that it was probably going to be the last time she saw her, but she wouldn't have had the chance to even if she wanted to. Footsteps raced noisily down the creaky wooden staircase and over to the table.

"Ilia!" Beth said, throwing herself at her. "Ilia, Ilia, Ilia! You're here!"

Ilia's eyes were wide, and she seemed too distraught to do much else than stare at Beth in confusion. When Ilia didn't return her hug, staying stiff as a board, Beth pulled away and looked at her. She was just as confused as Ilia.

"Ilia can't remember anything right now," Link said.

Beth's face fell even more as she stared into Ilia's eyes and continued to get no recognition from her. "You don't remember me...?"

"N-no, I don't," Ilia said. "I'm sorry..."

"But it's me! Beth!"

"Beth..." Link said. Once he got her attention, he motioned with his finger for her to come over to him, and she did. He put his hands on her shoulders and spoke to her quietly. "Renado's gonna help her get her memory back. Don't worry about her. Just go back to bed, okay?"

Beth looked over at Ilia one last time before sighing and nodding. "Okay... But I wanna get a drink first."

Link let go of Beth, and she sauntered off to the kitchen with her head down. Ilia put her elbows on the table and her head in her hands, whispering that she just wanted to lay down already. The woman told her to try to stay awake for a while longer, that she could sleep after being seen by Renado. After Beth went back upstairs, it became uncomfortably silent in the lobby. Vanna's thoughts wandered in the silence, first thinking about what it must have been like for Ilia not remembering growing up with Link and the kids ... and then realizing that she could relate, because what memories did Vanna even have of growing up?

But she didn't let herself keep thinking about it. She cleared her throat and stood. "Well, I'm gonna step outside for a bit."

She wasn't sure how to get Midna's attention without saying her name, so she just tapped her foot on Link's shadow as inconspicuously as she could and hoped that would get her to hop over into her shadow. Once she saw a flicker of black on the ground, she walked outside. Midna showed herself as soon as Vanna shut the door behind her. Vanna walked a distance away from the Elde Inn so that Ilia and the woman wouldn't hear her talking to Midna and think she was talking to herself.

"Give me the rundown. What happened in Lanayru?" Vanna said.

"Well, you already know just about everything. Link saw Queen Rutela's ghost, cleared the twilight, found Ilia in Castle Town and she couldn't remember him, and that boy was dying, so the lady told Link to take them to Kakariko. Kinda boring, but I think there was a slight fiasco with some monsters on the way here. I don't know. I slept through a lot of it." Midna shrugged. "But anyway, Link's planning on using the wagon in the morning to take all the kids down to Ordon for Colin's funeral, and then he probably won't want to do anything but mope around for a while..."

Vanna groaned. "I get that he's upset and all, but I wanna go home. There has to be something we can do to convince him to just come with us for a little while. We only have one more temple to go through."

"Actually, I have a plan of my own on my mind." It was hard to see it with her being a shadow in the dark of night, but she wore a mischievous grin.

"And just what would that be?" Vanna asked, knowing already that she wouldn't like it.

"We go by ourselves!" Midna said, enthusiastically throwing her hands out in the air beside her.

Vanna waited for Midna to tell her her actual plan.

She didn’t.

"...You’re joking, right?"

Midna huffed and crossed her arms. "I'm not joking, you idiot. Think about it. Who knows how long Link will be mopey for? I couldn't even get him to leave the kids for a week, and that was before one of them died, so imagine how long he'll want to be with them now. If we go by ourselves, you might even be able to be back home by tomorrow night, if you're really quick finishing up Lakebed Temple."

Vanna was tempted to say yes, right up until she said Lakebed Temple and reminded her that getting the Fused Shadows wasn't as easy as just showing up someplace and grabbing it. No, there'd be puzzles to solve and monsters to fight, ending with a battle against a giant boss, and in the case of Lakebed Temple, she already knew from Zi that the boss was Morpheel. Eel. She was not fighting a giant eel at the bottom of a lake.

But she didn't want to stay, either. She just wanted to go home and take a steaming shower and then curl up in her comfortable bed with her dog in her arms and go to sleep, and hopefully forget that she had ever even left it the morning of September 1st.

"Midna. You were there in the mines when I fell into the water..." Vanna trailed off, hoping she wouldn't have to actually admit what she was thinking.

"I know you can't swim." Despite the fact that she was right, Vanna immediately felt defensive because Midna said it. "But Queen Rutela told Link that she'd give him something so he could swim and breathe in deep water like a Zora if he'd save Ralis for her. Link's not going to need it while he's in Ordon. I'm sure he won't mind you borrowing it."

Vanna was wary to believe there was anything, even something in a world of magic, that would allow her to swim and breathe underwater. "I'll have to see what it is first before I'll consider putting my life on the line. If I don't believe it'll do what you say, then we're waiting for Link."

"Come on, Vanna. You don't need him. You're brave enough to go on your own, aren't you?"

She grimaced. The answer was no and she knew it. However, she wasn't going to admit that, either, so she deflected the question. "You seem very happy about getting to spend time alone with me even though you hate me."

"True," Midna said with a tilt of her head. "But you should be glad I am, because there's only one something, not two. It's either you or Link, and if it's not you, guess what you're not getting back?"

Vanna's hands curled up into fists at her sides. She wanted to dropkick her to the moon. It was bad enough that she was being forced to do everything with Link for her when Midna was the one that owed her, but having to do everything without any help at all was going too far. She was so angered by her that all she could do was stand there and glare at her, unable to articulate her whirlwind of frustrated thoughts into anything vaguely coherent.

"I think it's fair," Midna went on. "Link's had to clear the twilight multiple times now while you did nothing to help him."

"That was because I couldn't!"

"Yeah, and now one of you can't clear Lakebed Temple, so it's your turn to even the workload out. Besides... You can see yourself how devastated Link is. He'd really appreciate any help he can get, you know. But hey, it's your choice. If you wanna be stuck in Hyrule forever..." Midna crossed her legs and put her arms behind her head in a relaxed pose, still giving Vanna that smug grin that she wanted to smack off her face.

Vanna knew that Mr. Rider was still working on making the new NEVAs so Zi could come get her. If she didn't clear Lakebed Temple alone, she could just wait for him to finish them, but there were two problems with that. One, she had no idea how long it would take for him to finish, and two, they still didn't know if it would even work. She'd only managed to get to Hyrule in the first place because the NEVA she'd taken malfunctioned, so what was to say that that malfunction could be replicated in the new copies?

There were only two choices, and neither were foolproof. She could wait for Zi, with the good outcome being that she could eventually return home and the bad outcome being that she would be stuck in Hyrule forever, or she could go to Lakebed Temple alone, with the good outcome being that she could get home by tomorrow and the bad outcome being that she would die. When she looked at the pros and cons like that, it seemed simple, but it really wasn't. If she decided to wait for Zi and got stuck in Hyrule, she would never be able to forgive herself for not taking Midna up on her offer. She couldn't just miss what could easily be her only chance to get back home because she was scared.

"I hate you," Vanna said under her breath.

"Is that a yes?" Midna asked in a sing-song voice.

"Yes, it's a yes!"

Vanna turned around and stomped back to the Elde Inn. She was halfway up the porch's ramp when the doors opened, and out came Link, Ilia, and the woman. She tried her hardest to not show her anger on her face, but it was noticed anyway.

"Are you all right, honey?" the woman asked.

She nodded, and quickly came up with a lie. "Just got a letter from the postman. I'd rather not talk about it."

Vanna's lie seemed good enough for her. "Ah. Well, it was getting quite stuffy inside. We thought it best to come join you for some fresh air."

They all relaxed along the porch, and again silence reigned. It was about half an hour later when Renado joined them outside. Link, Ilia, and Vanna stood from where they had taken seats.

"How is he?" Ilia eagerly asked.

"He has passed through the worst of it. As long as he rests, he should recover in due time," Renado answered.

Ilia grinned widely and looked at Link. He smiled back, but Vanna could see the sadness in his eyes as he looked at her.

"Do you know the fate of his mother?" Renado asked. The question visibly sent a shock through Link, and his smile fell. "Her welfare consumes him. Since he started to regain consciousness, he has been mumbling deliriously about her almost constantly."

Vanna watched Link to see if he would respond. It was upsetting knowing that this young boy's mother had been murdered, but Link looked absolutely heartbroken by it.

"...I can see the knowledge grieves you," Renado said. "It must be an awful memory."

Though she hadn't been there with Link, Vanna thought this whole thing was a bit overdramatic. It wasn't like Link had watched her get murdered. Simply seeing a ghost wasn't that awful.

She frowned when she thought of reasons why Link looked to take it so hard. Maybe he was upset because she was another person he couldn't save, and he felt guilty. Maybe he was upset because it reopened his own wounds, reminding him of how he felt when he lost his mother.

Or maybe Link was just a bigger softie than she imagined and her assumption of anything else was because she didn't understand how someone could possibly be so empathetic.

Renado turned to Ilia. "Regaining your memory will not be simple, but I am certain if we give you some time, you will find your heart again."

"There's nothing you can do to speed up the process?" Ilia asked.

"I would like to study my books and see if I could find ways to speed up the process. Until I find something, all we can do is show you pieces of your past, and hope that eventually a piece will be the one to bring your memories back. If you would not mind, I would like you to stay here to recover."

Vanna doubted he would be able to help, but she said nothing of it. Even the leading neuroscientists in her world had yet to figure out the cure to amnesia.

"I don't mind," Ilia said, beginning to yawn in the middle of her sentence. "Is there a bed I can sleep in, here?"

"Go to the room upstairs, and choose any bed you would like. I have my daughter awake up there right now looking over the Zora boy; feel free to talk to her if you need anything. If you need me, I will be in the sanctuary at the end of the town, by the spring."

Ilia walked inside, and Renado walked away. The woman sighed and smiled, resting back against the railing.

"Nice to see there's still hope here. And it's always good to see happy results repay your efforts. Link... Any chance you're of the mind to put those skills of yours to use for Hyrule?" she said. Link raised an eyebrow at her. "What hope there is in our kingdom is frail and dying ... but there's still a group trying to do what it can. And I'm a member of that group."

She walked to stand in front of him, leaning forward a bit and outstretching her hand. "Call me Telma."

Link looked down, his eyes lingering for just a bit too long, and it took everything Vanna had in her not to snort—not that she could blame him. He shook her hand, and when he let go, Telma looked at Vanna. She reached out to her, then, and she gave her a handshake.

"What's your name?" she asked.

"Vanna."

"And you two are friends?"

She looked over at Link for a second. She wasn't too sure they could be called friends, considering how little they knew about each other, but she told Telma they were friends anyway and Link didn't object.

"I meant to ask you something earlier, Telma," Link said. "Could I borrow your wagon in the morning? I could have it back the day after tomorrow..."

Telma rested her arms on the railing again. "Sure. I was planning on staying here just a bit longer, anyway. I'm still worried about Ilia, and... Well, never mind about the rest."

She looked down the village, and Link and Vanna followed her eyes to see what she was looking at. Renado still hadn't reached the sanctuary, and she was staring at him with a sultry smile.

Vanna had already looked back by the time she approached Link again, but Link was startled by turning back around and seeing her standing there in front of him leaning over with her hands on her hips. "I want to see you at my bar again, you hear me?" She stood up straight after Link nodded. "The bar is actually a kind of safe house for my friends. There's a passageway that leads to the castle from in there, as well."

Telma started to walk away toward Renado, nearly skipping as she did, before stopping and turning around to say something more. "If you ever need anything, stop by. I'll be waiting for you, honey!"

She winked at Link, then started on her way again. Vanna couldn't help but laugh a little as she saw Link's dropped jaw and red face.

Chapter Text

"So," Vanna said to Link once Telma and Renado had made it inside the sanctuary, "Midna told me about Queen Rutela giving you some sort of gift if you saved Ralis. Do you need to go back up to Zora's Domain to get it?"

Link only got the word "I" out before his eyes trailed behind Vanna and his sentence was cut short. She looked over her shoulder to see what he was looking at.

Vanna had never seen her before, but she knew the apparition floating behind her in the road had to be exactly who she had just been talking about—Queen Rutela. Like her son, she wore nothing but golden jewelry, but the way her pink-white fins cascaded around her hips and down her legs made it seem almost like she was wearing a long skirt at first glance. Her hair, if it could be called that, reminded Vanna of jellyfish tendrils. Both her hair and fins swayed in the breeze as she began to slowly float down the road.

Link followed her, and after considering it for a moment, Vanna trailed along behind him. She assumed Rutela had to be leading them down to the spring, since the only other place to go that she knew of was out to the field, but instead Rutela went behind the sanctuary. Vanna had noticed there was room to walk around it, but she didn't think there was actually anything back there, so she was confused at first why Rutela went that way. It turned out there was a pathway hidden back there, and following it led them to a small enclosed graveyard.

At the back of the graveyard was a stone featuring a mark shaped like one of the jewels Rutela and Ralis wore. Rutela's form passed right through it, and after she did, it glowed before fading away to reveal a small hole behind it. As Link crawled through, Vanna changed her mind about following him. If Rutela was taking him so far out of the way, she probably wanted to talk to him alone. Still, though, Vanna got down on the ground and peeked in through the hole. She could see Link standing in a smaller enclosure, and she could just barely see the bottom of Rutela's fins floating in front of him.

They were still close enough that Vanna could hear Rutela's words. She thanked him for bringing Ralis to Kakariko Village and told him that the Zora people were buried in the graveyard, including her husband. Her husband made garments for 'the Chosen Hero' that housed the abilities of the Zora, and she urged Link to take them. She asked Link to tell Ralis to not grieve her, to be brave and live on as the Zora King. Her voice got quieter as she instructed Link to tell Ralis that she loved him, and then it disappeared entirely and her body vanished.

With her gone, Vanna crawled in through the narrow tunnel. She was stunned by how beautiful the alcove was. Clear water separated the ground she was on from where a soaking Link was standing. A large stone was on the slice of land with Link, and on either side him there were waterfalls that glowed cyan as they flowed down past the vines and branches growing over the earthen walls. She wished she could have come back to the scenic hideaway during her time in the village that she had nothing else to do—until she realized the stone Link was standing in front of was probably the gravestone of the last Zora King. 

Link turned around, holding the folded set of clothes in his hands. He placed the outfit in his pouch before jumping into the water and swimming over to join Vanna. Midna came up out of her shadow.

"Do you think you're gonna use those clothes while you're down in Ordon?" Midna asked.

Link's face was blank as he replied in monotone, "I'm going for a funeral, not a swim."

"So, can Vanna borrow them for a while?"

Link looked at Vanna, and she looked at Midna. She hadn't thought Midna was going to ask him for her.

"I'm staying here with her while you go down to Ordon," Midna explained. "She needs to learn how to swim before we go to Lakebed Temple, and I thought it'd be fun for us to have some girl time together. Isn't that right, Vanna?" She smiled at her.

Vanna had to fight back to make her face not contort in disgust, and it was just as hard to hide the disgust in her voice. "Yeah..."

"Okay," Link said slowly, an eyebrow raised. He took the outfit from his pouch and handed it over to her. "You two have fun, then... I'm goin' to bed."

Link crawled through the tunnel, and after a few moments Vanna crouched down and looked through to make sure he was gone. Once she saw him exit the cemetery, she stood back up and faced Midna.

"Why were you trying to keep it a secret that we're going to Lakebed Temple together without him?" she whispered, just in case.

"When we were in Castle Town, they tried putting the wagon on Epona, but she hated it, so Link has to take Telma's horse and leave Epona behind. I don't think Link would like it very much if he knew that you're going to ride his horse to Lake Hylia without him when you know nothing about horses."

Vanna stared at her in disbelief. "You didn't want him to know because you want me to steal his horse?"

Midna's one visible eye rolled. "I believe the word you're looking for is borrow."

"You just said yourself I don't know anything about horses! How do you expect me to know how to control her?"

"You'll have to figure that out yourself, won't you?" she said, crossing her arms. She interrupted Vanna after just one word. "You need Epona, unless you wanna go all the way across Hyrule Field entirely on foot. That would take forever, and you know you wanna get that last Fused Shadow as quick as possible."

Vanna tried to think of something else, but all that came to mind at first was just how much she wanted to punch herself for not having taken her TPort with her. The thought of teleporting then reminded her of something else. "Can't you just warp us to Lakebed Temple with a portal?"

"No. You can't warp through the portals. You'll get stuck in the twilight."

Her eyes narrowed; Midna had to be lying to her. "You warped me out of the temples through portals when we finished them."

"Those were just quick short-distance portals that work more like that freaky bird-lady's warping magic than shadow magic—they didn't actually have to bring you through the twilight. Trust me, I wish we could just warp to Lake Hylia. Even with Epona it'll still take hours to get there."

Again, Vanna's face contorted. She'd have to ride a horse for hours when she knew nothing about horses, to a place she didn't know the location of, with Midna pestering her all the way there, and then after that she'd have to go into an underwater temple with no help to speak of.

She groaned and threw her head back. "Just kill me."

When Vanna woke up in the morning, she headed over to the Elde Inn. Ilia, Telma, Renado, and Luda were eating breakfast together in the lobby, and they offered for her to join them. She told them she would in just a moment, and she went upstairs.

While laying in bed at night trying to get to sleep, imagining how going to Lakebed Temple would be, she had realized that she only had her sword. Link had her bow and quiver, the metal shield she had gotten, her lantern, the magic wind boomerang, and the iron boots. She didn't think the boomerang or the boots would be of too much use to her, considering she didn't have the magic necessary to control the boomerang how Link did, and she apparently didn't need the boots to stick to magnets anyway, but she knew she would feel safer having them just in case. She wanted to be as prepared as possible for the temple, and Link probably wouldn't need any of those things if he was just going to Ordon. He could survive for a while with just his sword and wooden shield. At least, that's what Vanna told herself as she sneaked up to him while he slept and she plucked what she wanted from his pouch.

Over the course of the next hour or so, the Ordonian children trickled downstairs one by one, and Link was the last person to join all of them. After Link finished eating, he went over with Renado and Telma to have a discussion about the best way to transport everyone down to Ordon, which Vanna listened to. They figured that nobody would be thrilled about sitting in a wagon for five hours with Colin's body, which led to the resolution that Link would take one trip to drop off the four living Ordonians, then come back to get Colin and bring him down. Renado was concerned about the lengthiness of the multiple trips through the monster-infested plains, but Link insisted he would be okay. Vanna, on the other hand, was also somewhat worried about it, because if Link was coming back so soon for his second trip, that meant he would notice without a doubt that she had taken Epona. She supposed it wouldn't matter though, really, because it would be too late by the time he found out for him to do anything about it.

Telma said Link could stay down there with her wagon for a few days if he wanted, and Renado reminded Link to bring Ilia with him upon returning. With the plan finalized, everyone went outside. As the kids and Ilia were saying their goodbyes to everyone not going with them, it hit Vanna that this would be her last time seeing Link. She got him to come over to the side of the road with her.

"I don't really know how to say this, but I guess I just wanted to thank you for ... well, everything, I guess," she said. "Being so nice to me even when I kinda broke into your house, and letting me stay there while you were gone, and saving me from that giant rock up on the mountain, and just saving me in general from all of the crazy stuff in this world."

"Like that crazy water in the Goron Mines that tried to kill you," Midna piped up from in her shadow.

Link chuckled at her comment, and though Vanna was slightly embarrassed by it at first, she ended up chuckling, too, after seeing Link's smile. "Really, though," she said. "Thanks."

"You're welcome," Link said. "...But why are you thankin' me right now? You make it sound like you're 'bout to leave."

She knew it probably seemed like a suspicious time to thank him—her hopes that he wouldn't catch on had been broken. Rather than telling him about Midna's plans, she had to come up with something else. "Well... Mr. Rider is working on new NEVAs so Zi can come get me, so I could be going home at any time," she said. It was technically true, but she doubted that they would be done before she was done with Lakebed Temple.

"Really? You never told me that, or about those people at all. I had no idea..."

Vanna was somewhat shocked at first to have it brought to her attention that she had never told Link about them, but then she figured it made sense considering how much of their time together was spent focusing on temples. "Zi is Mr. Rider's son and my best friend, and Mr. Rider is the man who invented NEVA. I've been communicating with Zi since I got here using my ... music-listening picture-taking thing, or phone as it's really called. Last I checked, the new NEVAs were about halfway done."

"So this could be my last time seeing you," Link said. She nodded, and he briefly looked over his shoulder to the wagon that the Ordonians were starting to get situated inside of. "If it is, then I guess I oughta thank you, too. It was real nice not having to go through the temple in the woods and all up the mountains and into the mines by myself. I probably would've died in the mines if you hadn't been there to get me out, so ... thanks for saving me, too."

"Come on, Link!" Beth called.

They looked at the wagon again, and when Link looked back at Vanna, without even thinking about it, she put a hand on his shoulder and leaned forward to kiss his cheek. What she was doing dawned on her the second her lips touched him. She quickly pulled away. His cheeks and ears were turning pink, and his eyebrows were raised in surprise. Her own cheeks started to warm.

Again, her mind raced to come up with a lie. "I-it's customary, in America, to—to kiss people on the cheek, after they thank you," she said. She started playing with her fingers nervously. "Guess you've never heard of people doing that...?"

"We don't do that down in Ordon... Maybe people in other places in Hyrule do?" Link said, his hand reaching up to rub the nape of his neck. "But, uh, I gotta go, now..."

"One last thing," Vanna said. She took a steadying breath. "You know how much Colin loved you, and everyone else. You need to tell them. Especially his parents."

Link frowned again, and he dropped his hand and nodded. "I will. Goodbye, Vanna."

"Goodbye, Link."

He walked over to the wagon, and after making sure everyone was all ready to go, he got on Telma's horse and took off. Watching them leave felt almost bittersweet, but more than anything Vanna felt self-loathing. It was bad enough that she had to go and make her last moment together with Link awkward, but that lie was just about the dumbest thing she had ever come up with. Why hadn't she just said it was customary to kiss people on the cheek when saying goodbye? Again, she supposed it was something that ultimately didn't matter—an awkward kiss on the cheek wouldn't make things more awkward between them in the future, because they had no future together at all—but she still couldn't stop beating herself up over it.

Then, of course, Midna had to come up out of her shadow after everyone was gone and make fun of her for it. "Aww!" she giggled. "Wasn't that just so sweet of you to give him a little kiss?"

"Shut up," Vanna grumbled under her breath, rolling her eyes. "I think we should wait awhile before leaving so Link can't look back and see me on Epona in the field."

"Why don't you take some time to practice riding her back and forth in the village before we leave, then?" Midna suggested.

With a nod, Vanna walked over to Epona, and Midna floated along behind her. It was as she got right next to the horse that she remembered how much of an ordeal it had been trying to get up on her even while Link was on her and holding her hand for support. It was so much easier when he had lifted her up. She held onto the saddle instead while she tried to get on, but she couldn't get her right leg over. Epona was just too tall.

"This is hilarious, but also kind of sad," Midna commented from behind her.

Vanna huffed and glared back at her. "I'm sorry we can't all just levitate around wherever we want," she said before turning her attention back to trying to mount Epona.

"You could just walk onto the porch she's standing next to and get on from there."

...That was definitely a better idea.

She silently walked onto the porch and climbed up onto the fence, and from there it was easy enough to hike her dress up and stretch her leg over Epona's back. Epona whipped her head back and neighed loudly when she settled onto her. Vanna shushed her, though it did nothing to stop her. She was making it seem like Vanna was trying to murder her when all she was doing was sitting on her.

"I've ridden on you before! Stop freaking out!" Vanna said.

She tried petting Epona's neck in an attempt to calm her down, but it only seemed to make her more aggravated, so she stopped and sat on her completely still and silent. Epona slowly got over her tantrum by herself.

"Okay," Vanna said gently, petting her again, "we're gonna go, okay, girl?"

"Whenever you decide to leave, go through the southern exit, and then take a straight shot west across the field. I'll help you find the lake once we get close," Midna said before retreating into her shadow.

"All right." She nodded and grabbed the reins, and she softly kicked Epona's flanks with both of her heels. "Go."

She didn't go, so Vanna did it again, but not quite as soft with the kick. Epona still didn't go, but she was scared to kick her any harder, even though she knew horses were tough. She thought back to what Link had done to make her start going, and remembered that along with kicking, he made a little noise. Vanna kicked Epona again as she mimicked the noise Link had made, and then Epona took off at a snail's pace. Though she appreciated her going slow as she learned how to ride, Vanna felt like she was only doing it to taunt her, and she worried that Epona was going to continue going just as slow when it was time to leave. At the rate she was walking at, Vanna could get to the lake faster on her own two feet.

It was hard getting Epona to turn around at the ends of the village at first, but she responded better with every lap they took. She started to run when Vanna kicked her again, and she made her go a few more laps at her higher speed before leaving out into the field. Upon realizing that the wagon was still within sight, albeit far away and headed in a different direction, Vanna kicked Epona again to make her go even faster. If Link noticed them, there was no way he was catching up with them.

With every stride Epona took, Vanna's body bounced up and down on the saddle, and she smiled widely as she took in the sight of the vast field. Walking around in Ordon and Kakariko by herself was like nothing compared to how freeing it was to ride Epona across the plains. It was scary, sure—exceptionally so when she noticed some monsters roaming about in the distance—but a little bit of fright was worth it to have the most liberating experience of her life. She giggled as she thought about how infuriated her mom would be to know that she was riding a horse by herself in a field with monsters.

"What's funny?" Midna asked, not bothering to show herself.

"Nothing, really. It's just... My mom would kill me if she knew what I was doing right now."

Midna hummed, but didn't respond further than that, which Vanna was grateful for. She wasn't in the mood to hold a conversation with her when they were going to be stuck together for hours and hours, and she enjoyed having Epona's hooves racing along the ground and the wind blowing against her being the only sounds she heard. After Epona barreled right through the first monster on the field without a problem, Vanna started to relax more.

She just had to try her hardest to focus on not thinking about what was waiting for her at the bottom of a lake.

Hours later, and after much trouble getting Epona to stop running, they were finally at the lake. Not right before the water, though, no—they were on a bridge high above the lake, with only one way to get down into the water...

"I am not jumping off a bridge!"

"Oh, stop being such a baby," Midna said. "The outfit Link gave you will make it easy for you to swim and impossible for you to drown. You'll be fine."

"I won't get the chance to drown if I die as soon as I hit the water! That lake is like two hundred feet down! There's no way I can survive that!"

"Link jumped down into the lake off this bridge, and he survived. And the lake was basically a puddle when he jumped down into it. You. Will. Be. Fine. Just put on the armor and make a leap. Close your eyes if you have to." Midna went back down into Vanna's shadow, her way of saying that the conversation was over.

Part of Vanna thought that Midna was lying so that she'd jump down and break her neck and then Midna wouldn't have to deal with her any longer. She made a noise somewhere between a groan and a whine as she got into her pouch and retrieved the outfit. She sat it on top of the thick safety wall of the bridge, and reached down to grab the hem of her dress.

"...Do you have to stay in my shadow while I get changed?" Vanna said.

"What's wrong with me being in your shadow while you get changed?" Midna asked.

"Hmm, maybe I don't want you down there looking up at me while I'm getting dressed?"

"I don't know if you realize this or not, but it's really dark in your shadow. So dark I can't see, in fact."

In hindsight, Vanna probably should've realized that herself. "Oh..."

"And I wouldn't want to look at your naked pale ass anyway."

Vanna shot Midna a glare that she couldn't see, then looked down the bridge both ways. Monsters aside, she hadn't seen a single soul on the way out there, but she wanted to make sure nobody was nearby anyway as she quickly stripped out of her clothes. She struggled trying to figure out which part of the Zora outfit was supposed to go where. Once she figured it out, most of it looked big on her. She couldn't even end up wearing the calf, arm, or thigh armor pieces because they just wouldn't stay on. The only parts that fit her okay were the wetsuit, which she assumed had to be because of some magic spell what with how it formed to her body perfectly, the hip pieces, the helmet, and the hood with a dangling tail. The hood was the same material as the wetsuit, forming to the contours of her face like magic. She could breathe just fine despite the fabric covering her nose and mouth, so she assumed—hoped—that it and the wetsuit were really the only things needed to grant her the abilities Queen Rutela boasted.

She climbed up on the wall, adjusting the flippers on her feet again after she got up. Looking down at the water, she felt like she may as well have been holding a knife against her throat. Multiple times she told herself that she would jump on three, but chickened out when she got to it.

"You're lucky I'm just a shadow and I can't push you off..." Midna said.

Vanna ignored her. If she was going to risk her life, she was going to do it at her own pace. The longer she stood there staring, though, the more she worked herself up. She told herself repeatedly that she had to do it eventually; she was just delaying the inevitable.

Finally, she took a deep breath in and jumped.

Chapter Text

A scream ripped through Vanna's throat louder than any noise she had ever made.

After an eternity of falling, she crashed into the water. She swam up as soon as she could, wondering how in the world she was still alive. Her fingers hastily reached up to pull down the material that covered her mouth and nose, allowing her mouth to fall open to take in bigger breaths. Her entire body trembled, partially from the fear that still lingered within her, but the real culprit was the water. It was freezing. She should have expected as much; she knew that the lake in Ordon and the spring in Kakariko were cool and that it was getting colder out in the nights and mornings, and she had noticed on the ride to the lake that some leaves were starting to turn red and that the grass wasn't quite as green, yet she hadn't thought at all about how the quickly-approaching autumn would affect the temperature of the lake.

As if this whole scenario wasn't already bad enough. She hated swimming, she hated having to risk her life, she hated having nobody there to help her, and she absolutely hated the cold. Her family and friends had told her she was being dramatic when she complained about feeling the cold in her bones, but she was telling the truth. The cold gnawed right through to her core. Even with the wetsuit helping the areas it covered, she knew that she would be shivering in no time. If given the choice, she would have taken the blistering heat of the mines over the chilled water in an instant.

"Now, that wasn't so bad, was it?"

The sound of Midna's voice reminded Vanna that she still hadn't opened her eyes. When she blinked them open, Midna was hovering just above the water's surface. "Yes, it was!"

"Oh, really? Hm. You could've walked down to the lake from a path over there," Midna said, pointing her finger.

Vanna looked to where she pointed. There was a narrow outcropping along the rocks that shot all the way around the lake up to the field, leading down to the patch of land that stretched the southern edge of the lake. "Why didn't you say that was there earlier instead of making me jump off a bridge?!"

"Because I wanted to make you jump off a bridge. Anyway, temple's down there, so get going. You should probably put those flippers back on, too."

Midna disappeared, leaving Vanna seething in anger by herself. She was fully convinced Midna did want her to die, and at that point, the feeling was mutual. Midna had said Vanna was the one lucky that she was just a shadow, but she was really the one that was lucky, because if she wasn't a shadow then Vanna would've drowned her in the lake.

Fantasizing about pinning her under was momentarily cathartic, but then Vanna realized she'd only be hurting herself more in that situation. If Midna died, the chances Vanna would ever get back home would be lowered drastically, maybe even entirely for all she knew. As much as she hated it, she needed Midna.

She just didn't need her nastiness.

As Vanna retrieved the flippers that had come off her feet sometime after her jump, she informed Midna that she'd be practicing her swimming for a while before going down, and that she would only leave when she was ready, not at Midna's command. Midna wasn't happy about it, but for once, Vanna thought Midna knew that she wasn't going to bend for her. She took it as a small personal victory.

If the outfit truly helped her swim just like a Zora, then the Zoras had to be the least graceful aquatic species ever. She wondered if it was because she didn't have the full outfit on, or if she was just so bad at swimming in the first place that it could only do so much, or a combination of both. Despite it not making her swim exactly how she hoped, it still helped her immensely, somehow. She almost didn't feel like herself swimming around in it. It felt especially strange when she started practicing swimming around while completely submerged—not just because of it being something she'd never really done before, but because she could still breathe as if she were on land.

Vanna swam all over the lake for practice, trying her hardest to distract herself with the calming scenery. When she was as comfortable with swimming as she thought possible—which is to say, not very—she began to swim downward. The deeper she went, the more she felt the water pressure increase, and the harder she found it to force herself to swim farther. The idea of using the iron boots to make herself sink down popped into her head, and immediately she took her pouch off and brought it around in front of her so she could make sure nothing else slipped out into the water. She opened up its flap, and found that there seemed to be some sort of magic barrier over the top of it, not letting any water inside. After pulling just one boot out and replacing a flipper with it, Vanna immediately began to be weighed down, and the addition of the second boot sped up her descent.

As she sunk down, the necklace that went with the armor floated up in front of her face. The pendant was glowing the same bright cyan as the waterfalls where Queen Rutela's spirit had left the world. Vanna doubted it would manage to slip off her head with the headgear she had on, but she reached up to hold it in her hand just in case. It felt like water was swirling inside the glowing gems. She tried to focus on the sensation of it rather than how rapidly she was approaching the temple.

Her fears were slightly alleviated by the sight of several Zoras swimming around near what she could tell had to be the entrance to the temple. If something were to happen to her, they could probably help bring her to safety, given she could get to them in time. The sight of them also confirmed to her that she absolutely was not swimming like a Zora. Most of the Zoras were swimming in place, but one was gracefully swimming all over in an underwater version of figure eights.

Vanna came to a stop at the bottom of the lake with a muted thunk, and then she took the boots off and put the flippers back on. Two Zoras were guarding a hole that had been blocked off with rocks, which she presumed to be where she would swim inside from. She hesitated swimming up to the Zoras to talk to them about letting her in. She knew from the start that there would be water inside of the temple, but it hit her just then that it would more than likely be filled with nothing but water, and following that, it would be completely dark. She'd have to rely on either her phone's light, which would come at the cost of not getting to use one of her hands, or she'd have to rely on only what little light the pendant gave off. She looked to the surface high above her, wondering if and worrying that it would be the last time she'd ever see the light of the sun again.

Ignoring every part of her brain screaming at her to go back up, to trust in Mr. Rider's ability to get her home, she swam over to the Zoras. She couldn't handle the shame of proving that she was the cowardly quitter Midna thought she was.

"Sir!" said one of the Zoras.

'Sir?' Vanna knew the scale-covered armor didn't lend very well to her body with its lack of shape, but she thought she should have been recognizable as a miss anyway. In all fairness, she couldn't tell if the Zoras she was looking at were male or female, either, so she couldn't blame them too much. Beyond a few minor differences in the markings and colorings of the Zoras, they looked very similar to one another, and very androgynous, with a mix of soft curves and defined musculature. She tried to determine what they were with the image of the Queen in her mind, but she had no idea if the ones she was looking at had toned fish pecs or small fish breasts. Apparently that was just life in Hyrule.

"You wear the garb of the Hero in my people's legends!" the Zora said. "Are you, perhaps...?"

There was an explanation for her being called sir, aside from them not knowing enough about humans to be able to easily differentiate between men and women. If the hero from their legends was a man, and she was wearing his clothes, it was a reasonable enough assumption to make, though Vanna still held that she looked like a girl regardless.

She decided to go along with it instead of explaining that she had just borrowed the outfit, thinking they would be more likely to let her inside their temple if they thought she was 'the Hero.' She responded a muffled, "Yeah, I'm the Hero. I'm here to, um, save your people from the dangers in the temple."

The two Zoras looked happy to hear that she was the Hero, but their enthusiasm drained away quickly and was replaced with horror.

"The temple has been overrun by monsters," the other said.

"We've already done all we could and sealed them in so they can't bring darkness to others. It is simply too dangerous inside. I must ask that you turn back," said the first.

That seemed like the perfect excuse to leave, yet Vanna knew Midna wouldn't care and would want her to fight back to be let in. "Well... I'm here on orders from Prince Ralis. If you don't let me in..."

Her open-ended not-really-a-threat threat worked. The two Zoras guarding the entrance quickly discussed the best way to clear the entrance of the rocks that obstructed it, and decided to ask another nearby Zora who made water bombs to let them use one to blow it open. Vanna backed away from the entrance when they and the bomb maker came over with a bomb, and after it was placed, they backed away as well. Seconds later, the bomb detonated, clearing all the rocks from the opening.

'Claustrophobia' wasn't a word that Vanna had ever thought applied to her, but seeing the cleared entrance made her begin to rethink how she felt about small spaces.

She looked up to the surface one last time before swimming into the hole.

If there was one good thing about being underwater, it was the fact that at least Midna couldn't tell that she was crying. She briefly considered asking one of the Zoras to come along with her; it would help just having one of them there next to her, even if they didn't help her fight or anything. But Vanna was certain that Midna would not approve of her asking for someone to go with them, and judging by how adamant the Zoras had been that the temple was too dangerous to enter, they probably wouldn't want to risk going inside regardless.

Vanna naturally expected it to get darker the farther she went in from the entrance, but to her pleasant surprise, it didn't. The pendant began to glow brighter in the darkness, illuminating the tunnel with its cyan radiance. The tunnel kept on going down, and down, and down, and down, until coming to what seemed at first like an abrupt end. Knowing that had to be wrong, she looked around, and realized that the tunnel went on upward from there. Looking up, she saw what looked like the surface of the underwater tunnel—which was somewhat confusing, considering that no part of the temple was above the water level of the lake—and two jellyfish that were probably as long as she was tall.

As she swam up toward the side of the tunnel opposite of the side where the first jellyfish was floating, it started to generate electricity. The only thing on Vanna's mind was that she needed to get away, so she started swimming up as fast as she could to get out of the bounds of its current. Because she was looking down to make sure its electricity didn't reach up to her, she didn't realize that she had already swum up to the second one until she felt herself get shocked. And as expected, given her awful luck with electricity over the past few weeks—first NEVA, now this—it wasn't just like the small shock you sometimes get when touching something metal. It hurt worse than when NEVA had electrified her, and felt like it lasted an eternity longer.

When the jellyfish finally let up, Vanna hurried and swam the rest of the way up the tunnel. She emerged in a domed and notably not-underwater room. She climbed out of the water and sat down curled up on the floor, her body still shaking. The exposed parts of her arms and face were burning, while the rest of her was freezing from the water.

"Are you crying?"

Vanna didn't bother looking up at Midna. "Go to hell." She tried her hardest to show that she wasn't going to take any of Midna's attitude, but it was a lot harder than normal to sound threatening when her voice was squeaky and wavering.

"Ooh, someone's moody today... Is that really the way you should be talking to the person who's helping you get back home?"

She clenched her fists, telling herself not to bite. Talking back to Midna was more trouble than it was worth. She just needed time to calm down, time to let it sink in that she was no longer underwater, no longer being shocked, and no longer in the tunnel. Thankfully, Midna didn't push it more, and she let Vanna sit there and cry it out.

Midna broke the silence after several minutes, when Vanna was starting to calm down some. "There's a monster coming for you."

At her words, Vanna finally looked up. Just a few feet ahead of her was a purple blob—it looked like grape jelly that had come to life and was inching along the floor. It was far from what she was expecting to see when warned of a monster. Even the harmless Ooccoo looked infinitely more menacing. She knew that even if it wasn't dangerous, it at least wasn't friendly, or else Midna wouldn't have called it a monster, so she got her bow and quiver out and shot at it. Instead of turning black and blowing up, the jelly blob simply split apart into two smaller blobs, and continued inching along toward her. After she shot each of them, they were reduced to little purple puddles on the floor.

"You're welcome," Midna said.

Vanna rolled her eyes and pulled the face mask down under her chin. She looked away from Midna and rubbed the remaining tears out of her eyes. "Thanks. That grape jelly would've just killed me if it weren't for you."

"They actually cling to your face and suffocate you, so yes, it would have. You're welcome."

She was embarrassed by being wrong, but it was easy enough to justify to herself why she had no reason to think the blobs would be able to hurt her. They really did look like moving grape jelly.

Despite how much time she'd spent both the night before and on the way to Lakebed that day obsessively worrying about how everything would go, Vanna had somehow managed to not think about something that seemed so very obvious at that moment. Her stomach growled, and she had no food.

Water, at least, she had plenty of. She had two filled canteens and a glass bottle of water in her pouch, and if she ran out of that, there was always the water in the temple, even if she wasn't too thrilled about drinking potentially contaminated water. Besides, she knew she could just get some antibiotics when she got home if the water really was contaminated. There was no solution to her lack of food other than to leave and find some. While she wasn't happy having to go back through the tunnel, she figured that she wouldn't have to go very far beyond it to get some food, considering that there was a floating house on the lake.

She wasn't sure how to broach the subject with Midna, so she started out just by saying, "I'm hungry."

"And?"

"And I want to eat."

"Then eat."

"I don't have any food."

"Not my problem. And you won't starve to death over the next few hours."

Of course Midna didn't seem to care. Vanna didn't think she ate or drank, unless her shadow was secretly hiding a shadow restaurant. "I know I won't starve to death. I'm worried about not being able to concentrate on what I'm doing because of being hungry."

"Then try harder to concentrate. You can't go back now. Hurry up and get through the temple, and then you can go home and eat." In a clear display of her desire to end the conversation there, she retreated into Vanna's shadow.

Groaning, Vanna pressed her palms into her eyes.

She was so close to going home. Just a few more hours. She could handle it.

She slowly got to her feet, slinging her bow and quiver over her shoulder, and took the time to look around the room she was in. Up a short set of staircases, two sconces were lit on either side of a gate, but the fires didn't light the room much. The pendant was providing most of what light there was, casting the room in cyan everywhere besides the small areas covered by the warm light of the fires. Before moving, Vanna put her flippers into her pouch and poured out the water that filled her boots. She walked up one of the staircases, eyeing a golden pulley hanging between them as she did. At the top, she reached over to grab it, and yanked it down.

The gate opened as a result, clearing the way to a door that she then walked up to. Vanna could tell it was like the modern doors from her world, going up into the wall instead of rolling to the sides like the doors from the previous temples, but it was different enough from the doors she was familiar with to leave her confused. There was no scanner to activate or button to press on the wall, and given its square shape it couldn't reasonably be rolled over. She thought that maybe it had something to do with the flames on the wall, like how a bridge was raised in the Forest Temple because of four torches being lit. She turned around and walked back down the stairs, and searched for hidden torches or sconces behind the columns around the room, but she found nothing. Her eyes scanned the floor for any switch to step on as she returned to the door. By the time she made it back without a single clue how to open it, she was starting to get disgruntled. There were no switches, no buttons, no torches to light, and the pulley was down as far as it would go. Why couldn't they have just gone old-fashioned and put handles on the thing?

Midna popped up out of Vanna's shadow to her side. "Why are you procrastinating in here? Just push the door up and go in, already."

Vanna put both of her hands against the door, and with a shove upward, the door started to open from the bottom.

Once again, she found herself embarrassed by Midna, but she was thankful that Midna seemed to think that she was just procrastinating and not actually stumped by a door that had to be opened manually instead of with the press of a button.

The door led to a long bridge high above flowing water, and there was another door—one with good old-fashioned handles—at the end of it. The light of the pendant didn't extend nearly far enough to cover all of the ring-shaped room, but Vanna could just barely make out more bridges to the left and right, all connected to the same place she was headed into. There was just one challenge before she could get inside to what she assumed was the main room, in the form of a monster she hadn't yet seen.

The monster started racing toward her, dagger and shield at the ready, and Vanna rushed to ready her bow and shoot an arrow at it. It raised its shield in the nick of time, the arrow bouncing right off it. Vanna didn't think it wise to try again what had already failed once, which meant her only other option was to use her sword and shield. She dropped her bow, and pulled her sword out of its scabbard and held her shield in front of her. She tried to think back to everything the Hero's Shade had taught her, but when the monster got close enough, she more or less ended up slashing her sword around nonsensically while cowering behind her shield as much as she could.

In her frenzy, she managed to slice the left arm of the monster, that she now noticed was essentially a bipedal, human-sized lizard. It threw its arm back with a screech, leaving an opening for Vanna to stab her sword right through its chest. It kept screeching in pain and it thrashed its body around her sword, more blood squirting out the more it did. Vanna thought it would have turned black and exploded into nothing at any moment, but it just wouldn't die. She attempted to pull her sword out to drive it back in again, only to find that it was stuck.

Holding her shield up above her to protect from the thoughtless onslaught of slashes from the monster's dagger, she crouched down and got an arrow out. Without standing, she used the arrow like a knife, stabbing it up underneath the monsters shield and piercing through its stomach. It was enough to finish it off. The monster fell on its back and puffed away, leaving Vanna's sword on the ground. She picked it up and looked over the completely blood-coated blade. She was slightly disgusted by it, but more than anything, she felt proud of herself. That monster was the first one she'd killed with her sword—sort of—and it didn't even get her once. All the blood on her sword, her body, and the ground was the monster's. Her record of never having seen her own blood continued on.

After resituating her weapons, Vanna went on through the double doors at the end of the bridge. Though it was technically the third temple she'd been inside, Lakebed was the first that actually looked like a temple to her. A massive chandelier supplied ample light to the circular two-level room. The only way she could go to start was down the stairs, because of fences blocking her access to the rest of the upper room, but she didn't go down right away. She saw a wriggling pot on the other side of one of the fences. She walked over to it, having a solid clue in her mind as to what, or who, it was, even though it made no sense. Ooccoo poked her head out and looked at her, and like instinct Vanna drew back in revulsion, but she kept walking to the fence after the shock of how creepy Ooccoo continued to be wore off.

"Vanna! Would you please help me out?” Ooccoo asked.

She looked up; the fence was tall, and while it had holes cut into it rather than bars, she knew she wouldn't be able to climb up over it because of the rocks at the top. "I'll have to find a way around so I can get you out, okay?"

"Oh, all right... I suppose I can't do anything but wait after all..."

Vanna couldn't keep herself from asking the questions she desperately wanted to ask. "How did you even get down here? And why do you keep on getting in pots when you know you get stuck every time?"

Ooccoo blinked, and disappeared into the pot.

Chapter Text

After going down the stairs, Vanna went to the only door that wasn't blocked off by fences. It opened up to another long bridge, perhaps one of the same bridges she had seen when she first came in, with an unmoving waterwheel in the middle of it. A blue Tektite hopped toward her, and she managed to off it with four quick slices. Once the Tektite was dead, she walked up to the waterwheel to examine it and figure out what she had to do. She pushed and pulled it with all of her might, but it wouldn't budge. She wondered if she needed to get water to move it for her. There was another bridge overhead, so she knew that getting water to dump down from above onto the waterwheel wasn't an option.

The water would have to come along the bridge itself. The doors at both ends had holes at the bottom that would easily allow water to gush through them, and the sides of the bridge were raised enough that water wouldn't spill over. She wasn't sure how in the world she was supposed to channel a stream of water toward the wheel, but she hoped that the answer would make itself obvious when she got to it. With seemingly nothing more to do on the bridge, she went back the way she came.

She spent an embarrassingly long time walking around the central room, going back up and back down the stairs and examining everywhere she went diligently, looking for another door she could enter that she had managed to miss, or at least a way to make it past one of the fences. It was only as she was about to make her way back down the stairs for the umpteenth time that she stopped, and her eyes locked onto the golden pulley that hung above the staircase. She reached up and tried to yank it down. It didn't move, but she knew she found her answer. There were more golden pulleys hanging from both the top and bottom floors. One of them had to do something.

The one right at the bottom of the stairs didn't move either, so Vanna went to the next one over on the bottom floor. It was hanging a ways over the edge, meaning she'd have to jump over to it and risk falling far down into the fish-infested water. She was too high up to tell what exactly they looked like, but given that she was in a temple she worried that they were some type of monster fish. She took a running start and leaped over to the pulley. As her hands clasped onto it, her body weight tugged it down. The staircase started to spin around, and came to a stop with the bottom below her feet. She dropped down safely, still surprised at what she had just watched happen. She hadn't known what to expect from pulling it down, but she never would have guessed that pulling it would make the stairs turn.

Unexpected as it was, Vanna was happy with her findings. She felt like she had just cracked the code that would help her solve the rest of the temple. Being able to move the stairs changed everything. She could get to places that the fences blocked off now, and she was that much closer to going home.

She walked up the newly-moved stairs, and at the top of the steps, she wondered which way she should go. She didn't think any fences were blocking her from getting to Ooccoo, but she already felt all turned around, and she wasn't sure which way she had to go to get to her. While she was searching before, she'd noticed that the baseboards along half of the room were red, and the other half were blue, which she thought could help her figure out which way to go, but now that she needed it, she started to doubt whether Ooccoo had really been on the red side like she thought she was. She decided to go right, down the red side, regardless, figuring it wouldn't be a big deal to turn back around and go the other way, and berating herself for not paying more attention.

Vanna was right the first time like she thought. She picked up the pot Ooccoo was in, and turned it upside down. With a shake, both she and her son came plopping out of the pot.

"Free at last!" Ooccoo proclaimed, shaking her feathers out. "Shall we stick together for a bit?"

Vanna agreed and opened up her pouch. Ooccoo and her son both flew into it and Vanna watched, still as amazed by them shrinking down to fit inside it as she was the first time. She closed her pouch, feeling much safer having them in there to bail her out if she needed.

The only door on the top red side was locked, and she had no key. After looking it over for any information that could possibly help her later—all she found was a fish head carved out of rock above the door, and some hieroglyphic-looking designs right below the fish that looked like tornadoes and squiggles—she went over to the blue side. Before entering on that side, she looked around the door. It had the same hieroglyphic-looking designs but in blue, and a similar fish head above it, but the fish's mouth was open unlike on the other side. Keeping that in mind, she went in.

It was another bridge with an unmoving waterwheel blocking her from getting to the other side.

With an annoyed groan, she left the room again to look for another lead. In front of the door, hanging over the edge, was a golden pulley. She jumped over to grab it, and the staircase turned again so that the top was right under her. At the bottom of the stairs was an unlocked door.

She dropped down to go to it, hoping that it wouldn't lead to another bridge she couldn't get past. Right as she got to the door, something to her left caught her eye. She walked over to it and picked it up. It was a folded piece of yellowed, somewhat soggy paper. Vanna sat down and unfolded it, revealing a map of the temple that was slightly confusing. There were six different blurred drawings, each marked with two little symbols to the side. The last letter marking the top four was what she was fairly certain was a Hylian F, while the bottom two started with a Hylian B. She hadn't yet seen the other symbols that went with them, but she noticed that the one with the fourth F matched the one with the first B, and the one with the third F matched the second B.

"Midna?" she called.

She came out of her shadow. "Hm?"

"I still can't read Hylian text that much. What are these?" Vanna asked, tracing her finger over the unfamiliar symbols.

"They're numbers."

That was her guess, but she'd wanted to make sure she was right. Looking at the map, the third F floor and fourth F floor looked like what she had thought was the top floor and bottom floor. "So, these two... They're actually the first and second floor, right?"

"Right. F1, and F2." Midna floated down closer to the map, and pointed to where she spoke of. "Then up there are F3 and F4, and down here are B1 and B2."

"B is for basement?" Vanna pondered aloud.

Midna shrugged. "I guess. But if you ask me, all of this seems like a basement..."

"Okay," Vanna said, standing up with the map in hand. "Thanks for actually helping me. Are you feeling sick?"

"Don't act like it's weird of me to help you! I wanna get out of here quick, too! Of course I'm gonna help."

"You didn't help me when I was wandering around for like half an hour looking for that pulley..."

"That wasn't my fault. I already told you, I can't see in your shadow. I can only hear. I'm never sure what exactly you're doing unless I come out of it. If you need help, just ask me, all right?"

"All right," Vanna mumbled. "You're probably just gonna make fun of me for asking for help, though, aren't you?"

"Yeah, I'll probably make fun of you, but I'll make fun of you while helping you. Even with a map, it'll be easy to lose your way in here. Just do me a favor and don't get too lost."

Midna disappeared into her shadow, and Vanna looked down at the map again. She didn't think she would get lost. She knew she might wind up confused and not sure what to do, but she thought it was easy enough to look at the map and tell where she was, at least. She folded it back up and put it in her pouch, and then went through the door.

Once again, it was another bridge, but thankfully there was no waterwheel. Instead, there was a creature that looked something like a cross between an armadillo and a little green rhino, with a spiked armor-like shell on its back and horn on its head. It started to charge at Vanna, and she quickly moved out of its way. It squealed like a pig as it rammed straight into the door. Its armor-shell didn't cover its rear, which she guessed was its weak spot that it could be killed through, but she decided to make a run for it instead. The door on the other side slammed shut behind her just in time to keep the creature out.

So soon after getting the map, Vanna was already confused. The room she was in didn't resemble its counterpart on the map very much at all. The map notably didn't do a good job of showing that up above the room was a giant gear on its side that had three smaller circular platforms hanging from chains attached to it. It looked like she could just swim over to two doors on the map, but they were high on the walls in reality and impossible to reach from where she was. Her only option was to go down a curved tunnel, coming out closer to the bottom of the room. The path led her right down to a small silver key.

She got out the map again and looked it over. The door that was locked was the one that was by Ooccoo, on the second floor. She just had to go back past the bridge, up the stairs, and around, no need to move the stairs or anything.

Midna came out of her shadow again. "Lost already?"

"Not lost," Vanna said, folding the map and putting it away again. "Just making sure I know which way I have to go from here."

"Hmm. Well, if you ever need to, you can ask me to remember things for you. Unlike you, I've got a memory like a steel trap!" With a giggle, Midna went back down into her shadow.

Vanna rolled her eyes as she started leaving the room. "My memory is fine. It's just like you said—even with a map, it's easy to lose your way in here. It's not my fault the idiots who designed this place decided to make it so confusing."

The bridge behind the locked door ended up being just like the one on the floor below it. There was no waterwheel, and there was another one of those shelled creatures. Vanna settled on calling them Rhinadillos in her head. Even if that wasn't their proper name, she liked having something to call them aside from 'those spiky green things.' She ran right past that Rhinadillo too, and into the next room.

A Tektite saw her immediately and started hopping toward her, and she killed it quick enough. As she sheathed her sword, she couldn't help but think that the Zoras were being a bit dramatic about the temple being overrun by monsters. So far, outside of the water she had only come across the Tektites, the Rhinadillos, the Grape Jellies, and the lizard thing that she couldn't think up a catchy name for. They had all been easy to either kill or avoid, though she did admit to herself that it was probably just dumb luck that she'd killed the lizard thing as easily as she had. She also admitted to herself that her thinking about how easy the monsters were was nothing more than an attempt to calm her nerves and convince herself that being in the temple wasn't as bad as it really was.

Vanna got out the map once more as she walked farther into the room. It seemed that the room she was in was the outer ring of another circular room—the upper level of the room with the sideways gear, she thought—and her goal was to reach the doors on the opposite side of the ring. There were walls to either side of the room with gated archways, and she noticed the one to the right had a pulley up above where the wall abruptly ended. She put away the map and went over to the gate. There were vines on the wall to its side, yet they were too high up for her to reach, so climbing up and over the wall wasn't an option. The gate was clearly made to go down into the ground, so she tried to push down on the bars, thinking it might have been like the doors, but it wasn't. It didn't move. It had to be the other gate, then.

Except it wasn't. That gate didn't move either, and upon closer inspection, she realized that couldn't have been the way to go at all; she could see another unmoving waterwheel through the bars, and there was no door to the inner room between it and the gate. It really was the left gate she had to pass through, but she didn't know how. She figured there was something to do with the pulley, and she had to get up to it using the vines, but she was too short to reach them.

She noticed a stash of five water bombs in the corner. Maybe she had to bomb the gates or something. Vanna called for Midna again. She knew more of Hyrule's workings than Vanna did, so she hoped she would know what to do with the bombs. They were the only clue she had left.

After Midna came out of her shadow and Vanna explained the situation to her, Midna offered a solution. "Why don't you use the bombs to knock down that stalactite over the vines, and climb up that to reach the vines?"

Vanna gave her an unamused look. "And just how do you expect the bomb to get up there? Do you want me to grow wings and fly it up?"

"...Huh. Well... What all do you have on you?"

"Bow and arrows, the boomerang, the iron—"

"Boomerang!" Midna interrupted. "That seems like a good idea, doesn't it? Just use the wind it creates to carry the bomb up to the stalactite!"

Her plan seemed like it could work at first thought. "...But Link used his magic to control where the boomerang flew. I don't have magic."

"Then you'll just have to figure out a way to aim it really well without magic."

After a few minutes of thinking of different ways to go about it, Vanna settled on one that somehow seemed both the most ridiculous and the most likely to work. She threw the bomb up in the air with her left hand, threw the boomerang with her right, and the bomb got sucked up into the whirlwind the boomerang created. Unfortunately for her, the bomb missed the stalactite. It was on her fourth try, with only one more bomb left to spare, that she got it. The bomb exploded as it hit its mark, and the stalactite fell down to the ground.

"Ridiculous," she muttered. That had to be the most convoluted way of solving anything ever. She didn't quite believe there wasn't a much easier way that they just weren't aware of.

"Hey, at least it worked," Midna said before shrugging and disappearing.

Vanna stuffed the spare bomb into her pouch in case she'd need it, and then finally made her way up the vines and over to the pulley. The pulley made the gate go down into the ground when she jumped and grabbed onto it. It was only after she was hanging that she realized the only way for her to get back down was to drop twenty or so feet to the ground. Closing her eyes, she let herself slip. It wasn't as bad as she thought it would be, but it still wasn't pleasant.

There were two options from there. She could go to the inner room from a door, or blow up the giant rock that was preventing her from going farther along the ring.

She decided to peek into the room first, and make her final decision after that. When she saw one of the lizard things guarding a door on the opposite side of the room, she let the door slam back down and retrieved the spare bomb.

The bomb blew the giant rock to pieces, opening the way to another door. She ran past two more Rhinadillos and into the room. The newest room had a new type of monster in it. It looked like an oversized insect, and it moved around from inside a protective bubble of water. Vanna slashed her sword at the bubble thinking that would pop it, but the little creature just giggled. It bounced toward her, and she backed away from it as far as the room allowed her. She got out her bow and arrow and shot at it. The arrow became embedded in the bubble without reaching the creature, and it giggled again.

Vanna quickly attempted to reuse the same key from earlier on the locked door leading into the room she was headed for, but when it didn't work, she turned around and left through the door to the side of the one she had come in from, back into the ringed room. Down a ledge, several Grape Jellies were inching along the ground, along with a single red one—a Strawberry Jelly, perhaps—and she could see bats hanging on the walls near the waterwheel. Most importantly, a silver key was shining on the ground next to the wheel.

She used her bow and arrows to kill all the monsters in the room before hopping on down and grabbing the key and the arrows she'd shot. She turned around and walked back to the ledge, but when she got up to it, she realized it was higher than she had noticed while she was on it. Even standing on her tiptoes with her arms stretched above her, her fingers couldn't reach the top. She groaned. If Link was with her, he could have lifted her and helped her get up there, but as it were, it looked like she was going to have to go through the door and into the room with the lizard thing, and then back around. She just had to hope that her dumb luck would pull through again.

It had been standing in front of the door she was about to open earlier, but when she opened it up, it had moved away from it. Instead, it was standing on the gear, looking over the edge at the room down below. Vanna closed the door behind her as quietly as possible, and stepped over onto the gear on her tiptoes, hoping she could sneak by and leave without it noticing her.

It started to turn its head in her direction, and she hurried to hide behind the thick pole that held the gear in place. As she heard its footsteps get closer to the pole, she got the feeling that a fight would be unavoidable. She reached up and grabbed the hilt of her sword. While the monster had been holding both a dagger and shield when she walked in, it wasn't holding them like it was ready to fight and defend with them. Attacking it while it wasn't ready seemed like a good idea to her.

When its footsteps were close enough that Vanna could tell it was just around the pole, she hopped out to the side with her sword and shield ready, and slashed her sword forward. Halfway through her slash, she noticed that the lizard thing already had its shield up. A fraction of a second later, metal hit metal. Her surprise attack had failed.

She decided that she may as well fight this one as she had the last one: like a total and utter wimp, hiding behind her shield as much as she could, and hoping like hell that one of her slashes would eventually get the monster.

But it seemed she had already used up all of her dumb luck that day, as the monster was nowhere near as dumb as the last one she had fought. It didn't repeatedly whack at her shield to no avail. From her hiding spot behind her shield, she could just barely see the monster jump up and spin around, and Vanna felt rather than saw the blades on its tail slashing through her left thigh. At first, it felt like nothing more than a scratch, but as what happened dawned on her, searing pain started to set in. It was like being shocked again, with the sizzling feeling of electricity zapping along the cut, getting stronger and stronger until it felt like it was on fire, and she couldn't help but scream.

She nearly threw her shield to the side as her swings became more erratic and more rushed. Her will to defend herself had been completely overpowered by the intense need to kill the monster already. She mimicked its own strategy, aiming for its lower body left uncovered by its shield. Vanna got it repeatedly in just seconds, but the numerous cuts on its legs did nothing to stop it. She raised her shield just in time to deflect one of its attacks, and right afterward, she managed to cut right across its stomach. It screeched loudly as it doubled over, and its face lined up perfectly with her sword. Vanna took the opportunity to stab it right through its mouth.

With her sword still inside it, the lizard thing exploded away into nothing.

Vanna dropped both her sword and shield and fell down to her knees. Her eyes squeezed shut, and her hands balled up into fists. The pain started getting worse without something to distract her.

She was scared to look at her cut, even though she knew she had to. She was terrified of seeing blood pouring out of her leg. She had never even noticed a bruise on her skin, much less an open wound; her mom had always been so overprotective that she'd never gotten to do anything that had a chance of harming her. What might have been a routine injury for others was an unheard of injury for her.

All things considered, she knew she'd been extremely lucky up until then, and a serious injury was really overdue. She had fallen off the bridge in the Forest Temple, she'd fallen off Epona, she'd been whipped and thrown against the wall in the mines, and she'd gotten shocked by a giant jellyfish—and not a single one of those things had left a mark. For being trapped in a world filled with monsters, that was hardly anything. She should've seen something else coming. Vanna pressed her hands against her eyes, trying to get rid of the tears without letting them out.

When she finally gained up the courage to look down at her cut, she saw no blood. She saw right inside of the gash, where there were wires and metal encased in translucent material instead of bone covered by muscles and tissues.

She heard Midna say something, but she couldn't decipher it. She felt like her brain stopped working. No thoughts crossed her mind.

An ear-splitting yell jolted Vanna out of her stupor, but she still didn't feel like she was back to normal. "Vanna!" Midna said. "What's going on with you? What is up with your leg?"

Vanna gulped, finding herself unable to look at Midna, or anything other than her leg. "I-I don't know... Maybe... Maybe something happened to it when I was a baby? And I got a prosthetic leg that blended in and grew along with me, and my mom never told me it was fake...? Prosthetics have come a long way..."

"Is that possible?" Midna slowly asked.

"I'm sure Mr. Rider could pull something like that off..." she said. "But no one ever told me."

"Well... You can communicate with people from your world still, right? Why don't you ask your mom about it?" Midna suggested.

She nodded and pulled out her phone. Her fingers shook as she typed in the question and sent it. A long minute passed before her phone vibrated in response. It was an incoming call from her mother. She gave Midna a look, and she hid in her shadow again. Even though Vanna knew Midna could still hear her from in there, it made her more comfortable to at least not have Midna staring at her.

"Explain," Vanna said as she answered the call.

"Please, Vanna, stay calm."

"What happened and why did you never tell me?"

Her mother sighed. "I... I don't want to beat around the bush. Just, promise me you'll stay calm."

"I promise. I don't even care about having a prosthetic leg. Just tell me why you thought I didn't deserve to know about what's going on with my own body."

"You do deserve to know—but I wasn't allowed to tell you before. You know that the Riders have been our family friends for a long time, and you know how passionate George is about his inventions. He needed people he could really trust to help him out with one, and..."

Vanna was certain she saw where it was going, and it filled her with rage. "So you let him chop off your baby's leg just so he could test out a growing prosthetic?!"

"That's not what happened."

"Then what happened?" she demanded. Her mom was silent for a few seconds. "Tell me!"

"He needed a family to take in his newest Synthuman prototype."

Vanna froze up again.

His newest ... Synthuman ... prototype.

Synthuman.

No. She was lying. She was definitely lying. There was no way.

"I feel pain," Vanna blurted out. "I feel pain and I eat and drink and my heart beats in my chest and I grew up like everybody else. And I'm deaf. Why would I—why would a Synthuman be defective? A-and Mr. Rider has said himself that we don't have sentient robots yet! I'm sentient!"

"I'm here with him, and I'm passing the phone to him right now, okay? He can explain everything to you better than I can..."

She heard shuffling before Mr. Rider's voice came through. "Vanna... Let me explain from the start," he said. "You were powered on for the first time at home with your parents. Everything went well for a while, but one day Lee and Daina left you home alone, and you accidentally cut yourself. You saw what was inside of you, and you ... lost it. When your parents came home, you were a metal skeleton standing in a pile of synthetic flesh and organs. You were driven to insanity by the knowledge of what you were. I had to power you down."

She felt something in her stomach she couldn't remember ever feeling before. Nausea.

Why would he lie to her about something like that?

"After wiping your memories again and messing with you a bit, I powered you back on, and you had a fresh start," he went on. "I knew from the beginning that you couldn't feel human without a beating heart, or if you didn't feel pain, or if you couldn't perform normal human bodily functions, even though those things aren't necessary for your survival, so I had to make you capable of them. You aren't really deaf, either. It was just another white lie to make you feel more human. And no, Vanna, you didn't grow up like everyone else. You've only been powered on for three years."

"Three ... years?" Vanna said, her voice a higher pitch than normal. Why was she even playing along? He was still lying. "I—!"

"You never grew up. Think back. You don't actually have any memories before your fourteenth birthday."

More lies. She was about to shout 'I do.'

But she stopped herself.

When she actually searched for a single memory of her childhood, she could think of nothing before the day of her fourteenth birthday. It was like...

"That was when you were powered on," Mr. Rider finished her thought.

Her brain—or some technological imitation of a brain, according to him—started going frantic, trying to find memories that weren't there, trying to find a way to explain away everything he said, trying to reconcile it with what she knew. "But—but I've seen pictures and videos of myself when I was little! I have them saved on my phone, in my hand! Mom even showed me pictures of the sonograms she got when she was pregnant with me!"

"That wasn't really you," he said. "That was who you were modeled after. Your parents' daughter. She died as a little girl, and your mother couldn't have any more children, so I offered to model my new Synthuman after her so that your parents could at least see what their daughter could have been like if she'd gotten the chance to grow up. The human Vanna is the one in the pictures and videos you've seen, not you."

The words 'I am the human Vanna, I am the human Vanna,' repeated in her head, as if just thinking it enough times would make it true.

Then, one after another, little things about herself rushed through her thoughts. Her mind rerouting when she tried to remember her childhood. The buzzing she always heard. Sight and hearing going to static. Never getting sick. Not sweating in intense heat. Never dreaming. Sleeping in exact eight-hour increments. Not experiencing the bodily changes she should have. Mr. Rider saying she was created before quickly backtracking and saying she was born. Sticking to god damned magnets. She'd compartmentalized all of it.

Tears had started flowing down her cheeks rapidly, and her breaths were heavy.

"...Why?" was the only thing she could get out.

"Why what?" Mr. Rider sounded bored, like her feelings were of no concern to him.

"Why would you even make me?! So you could brag that you tricked me into thinking I was a person when I'm not?!" Vanna said, her voice trembling through her cries. She started to cry harder, reality truly hitting her as she spoke it. "You already knew how it destroyed me once, so why would you even power me on again?! Why?! Imagine finding out that your whole life has been a fucking lie! How—how could you do this to me?!"

"I didn't create you to brag. For years, people have been dreaming of sentient robots, and I decided to try my hardest to finally give them what they wanted. I just didn't think my little 'sentient' prototype would prove as much of a problem as it has. After I found out the first time that the thought of not being human was enough to make it go insane—"

"'It'?" Vanna repeated. 'It'' was her.

"—I reprogrammed it so it couldn't react so violently, and if the reprogramming wasn't severe enough, I thought it having sufficient time to develop a firm sense of identity would guarantee it handling the truth calmly when it found out. That's part of why your mother was so overprotective of you, you know. You weren't supposed to find out yet, and you especially weren't supposed to find out like this. I'm sorry for not being able to tell you earlier, but I truly believed that your ignorance of your status as a Synthuman was essential," he said. There wasn't a single shred of remorse in his voice. "I suppose I was wrong, for once."

There were a million things Vanna wanted to say, but she couldn't make herself say any of them. Her world was crashing down around her, and all she could do was sit there and cry.

"There's no point in crying. Just get over it."

Her grip on her phone became so tight that she heard it crack. She started to yell into her phone, but she was barely aware of the words leaving her mouth. The only thing she was sure of was that she screamed out countless insults and questions that she wouldn't accept any answer to. Her throat was burning by the time her livid tirade was over, and she fell back into crying.

A voice that didn't belong to Mr. Rider sounded quietly through her phone. "Did she lose it again?" Vanna recognized the voice as Zi afterward.

Zi knew all along. Zi. It was one thing for her 'family' to hide such a secret from her, but her best friend?

"Dad, let me talk to her..."

A shuffling noise told her Mr. Rider's phone was no longer held up to his face, but it wasn't for the reason she thought. She could barely hear Mr. Rider say, "No, Zi. You need to move on. You got me to let her stealing NEVA slide, but this is going too far. She shouldn't be acting like this after all this time, after I reprogrammed her. As soon as I finish making these NEVAs and you bring her back here, that's it."

Vanna hung up immediately, holding her phone tightly in her quivering hand.

Her Synthuman hand, with metal bones and artificial flesh.

Chapter Text

Vanna spent minutes frozen in place, blurry eyes boring into the gash in her leg.

She still didn't quite believe it. She couldn't.

Her hands reached up and she dug her fingers deep into her ears, ripping out her hearing aids. Even once they were out, she continued to hear her ragged breathing, and the quiet electrical hum she had always attributed to them. It came from her. That constant buzz was from her body.

She whispered to herself, "No," and she heard it. She heard it just the same the next ten times she repeated it.

Vanna opened up the photo app on her phone and found her collection of old pictures she had saved. She clicked on the very first picture, with Vanna Lee Meadows – July 8th, 2102 written at the bottom. Her mom was in a hospital bed, dark hair disheveled and an exhausted smile on her face, and her dad was sitting next to her, grinning so wide that his blue eyes looked like two little black lines. Vanna was bundled up in his arms. Her skin was tinted a purplish-red, and her pink hat left some of the little red hairs that clung to her head visible.

The next picture was taken in the same room, but over on a bench. This time, it was a young, happy Jaylene holding her, while Kalina sat next to her looking discontent. She continued to scroll through the pictures she had, watching as she grew from a newborn to a toddler to a child.

The collection ended similar to how it started, and not long after it. The last picture, labeled as being taken in 2106, had Vanna laying back on a hospital bed—she remembered being told it was taken after she had her appendix removed—smiling weakly with her parents and sisters at her sides.

Except they weren't her parents or her sisters. She was never born, never held as a baby, never grew, never had her appendix removed, never had anything that the pictures showed at all, because that little girl wasn't her. That little girl was dead and her life was never hers.

Vanna's phone slammed against the wall before falling into the room below, and her hearing aids followed.

Midna came out of her shadow, slower than she usually did, and she spoke softer than she ever had to her. "Vanna, I... I heard all of that..."

She turned her body away from Midna, slouching over and covering her eyes with her hands. "Leave me alone."

Mr. Rider's words wouldn't stop repeating in her head. 'As soon as I finish making these NEVAs and you bring her back here, that's it.' She knew very well what 'that's it' meant.

Vanna reached around to the nape of her neck. She ran her fingers over the layer of synthetic skin just below her hairline, feeling for an imprinted product code. When she didn't find that, she pushed down into her skin until she felt what she feared the most was there, something right between two of her vertebrae, hard and as small as a grain of rice. Her own tracking chip, like all the other Synthumans had. No matter where she was on their planet, he could, and would, use it to find her. If she couldn't stop him from powering her off before, there was no way she could keep him from powering her off again. He stopped at nothing to do whatever he set his mind to do, and he had already set his mind to end her for not acting how he thought she should.

She couldn't go home, not as long as he was there. She felt safer in a world with pterodactyls and fire-breathing alligators and lizard swordsmen than in a world with him.

He wasn't going to win this time. He couldn't power her down if he could never find her.

But she had no idea where to go. She had no home in Hyrule. She thought about going back to Link's house, but Ordon seemed far too obvious. As close as Zi had always been to her, his loyalty to his father was unfaltering, and just like how Mr. Rider would stop at nothing to end her for not acting how he wanted, Zi would stop at nothing to find her for his father. He knew she had been in Ordon before, and there was a high chance that would be where he'd start his search.

The only other place Vanna knew of and had been so far was Kakariko. It seemed like an obvious place for Zi to search as well, especially considering that was the last place she'd told him she had been in, although he at least had no idea she had claimed her own little shack there. It wasn't luxurious—not that she'd ever lived in a place she considered to be, though the dinky modern apartment she lived in in America certainly was by Hyrule's standards—but it would have to do.

Vanna pulled her pouch off of her belt, and reached in and plucked out Ooccoo and her son.

"What do you think you're doing?" Midna asked.

She didn't bother responding to her. She was done with her. "Ooccoo, can you please get me out of here?"

"Yes, I can! Ooccoo Jr. can warp you right out, and you can return right here whenever you please!"

"He can come back to you by himself. I'm not coming back."

"What do you think you're doing?" Midna asked with more force. "If you leave, you're not getting your bracelet back!"

"I don't want it!" Vanna yelled back. "There's no point anymore! I can't go home when Mr. Rider will kill me if I do!"

"But we need to get that last Fused Shadow!"

"Fuck your Fused Shadows! I don't owe you anything for you ruining my life!" As Vanna yelled at her, her fist went flying toward her, only for her punch to pass right through Midna's shadowy body.

Midna stared at her blankly for a few seconds, before silently slipping back into her shadow. Still breathing heavily, Vanna looked at Ooccoo. She had her wings positioned strangely in front of her with her son held in them, and it took Vanna a moment to realize that she was trying to cover his ears.

"I'm sorry," Vanna said quietly. "Can I go, now?"

Once Ooccoo Jr. had warped her out and gone back to his mother, Vanna went up the incline out of the lake and found Epona grazing not far from the bridge where she'd left her. She brought Epona back over to the bridge, intending to use the safety wall to climb up onto her. As Vanna settled on her saddle, she looked out past the deep basin that housed Lake Hylia, where the green grass of the field faded into dirt, which faded into sand that stretched as far as the eye could see. There were structures out in the desert, and Vanna saw what looked to be a village. She thought briefly that it would have to be a better hiding place than Kakariko because of how far away it was.

Her mind wandered to Castle Town, then. She hadn't been there either, but Link had claimed it was filled to the brim with people, so even that seemed like a better potential hiding place. It'd be easier to blend in if it was densely populated, and on top of that, the town had to be easier for her to get to; she imagined it was near the castle that was partially visible from the field now that the wall of twilight was gone.

Epona nickered, and Vanna was reminded that she couldn't get to the desert village or Castle Town without her. She couldn't just steal Link's horse. He needed her, and even if he didn't, Vanna didn't know how to care for her. Vanna made a noise and tapped Epona's sides with her feet, and the horse took off.

It was dark by the time they got back to Kakariko Village, and aside from Vanna's cut not hurting any longer, she felt just the same as when she'd left the temple.

Telma's horse and wagon were right outside of the Elde Inn. Link was back already. Vanna knew he had to have realized that she and Epona were gone. She left Epona near Telma's horse, and when she went to walk back to her shack, she noticed light through the windows. She had never bothered to light the sconces inside; someone else had done it, and she had a clue who it was. Her fists clenched as she walked up to the house and opened the door.

Link was sitting on her bed, arms crossed and scowling. As soon as he looked her over, his expression softened.

"...What happened?" he asked gently.

"Just get out," Vanna answered, her voice breaking.

She saw Midna appear out of the corner of her eye, and she made a motion with her arm. Link looked back and forth between them before getting up and silently walking out, Midna leaving with him. Vanna locked the door behind them.

Vanna started to walk toward her bed, but she stopped and turned as she saw something else moving in the corner of her eye. It was her reflection in the mirror.

She knew they were, but she double-checked that the windows were up high enough that nobody could see in before she stripped out of the Zora suit and stood in front of the mirror. Her hands roamed her body as her eyes roamed her reflection. She felt human. She looked human.

But she looked the same as she always had. Sure, she had only been powered on for three years, and most girls didn't have a drastic change in appearance between fourteen and seventeen, but they did have changes, however minute they were. She didn't. She couldn't even blame Link for thinking she was fourteen when they first met. There wasn't a single part of her that had ever changed since she was 'fourteen.'

Her youthful face and short body were easily explained away by the idea that she was just a late bloomer. The fact that hair can only grow so much explained why her hair had always ended just above her hips without ever needing to be cut, and the fact that she'd never bothered to cut it regardless meant she never learned that it probably wasn't even possible for it to grow. Her mother's explanation for why her nails didn't grow either—'nails stop growing at a certain point, just like hair, and that point is different for everyone'—had been satisfactory enough for Vanna to never question it again. She felt incredibly stupid for falling for the lies she had been fed.

Yet, as she soaked in every detail of her body, it was easy to see how she'd fallen for the lies. She had no reason to assume that she wasn't human when what she saw in the mirror looked no different from anyone else. She looked overwhelmingly realistic. There were light veins on her wrists and hands and the inside of her elbows, even a few just barely noticeable ones on the front of her hips and her chest. She held her fingers against the pale blue lines on her wrist for the first time. No blood coursed through them. They were just surface details painted on where there should have been veins.

Vanna raised a hand to her chest and pressed down. It was far from the first time she had done that, but it was different this time. She had always found comfort in the steady beat of her heart, and now it just made her uneasy, because now she knew it wasn't a real heart. It didn't pump blood throughout the rest of her body. It was just a thing thumping in the middle of her chest in the way a real heart would to delude her into thinking she was a real person. Even something as small as her navel was for nothing more than deception, never having been attached to an umbilical cord. Deception was all everything was for.

She stood closer to the mirror, her nose almost touching her reflection. Her hazel eyes were glossy and her orange lashes were darkened and clumped together from being coated with a thin layer of tears. The whites of her eyes had turned red around the edges. Everything about them looked unquestionably real. The eyes were one thing Mr. Rider always got right on his robots that his competitors in the market never could—but just like Vanna's heart, it didn't matter how real her eyes seemed. Nothing, not even the way little red lines showed up to mimic the appearance of blood vessels the longer she cried, could make her forget that they weren't actually real.

The only giveaway was the cut on her leg. Her skin wasn't stretched out like it was when her legs were bent, making it impossible to see inside the cut while standing. Still, even unable to see inside it, it was clearly not what a cut looked like on a human. It was a clean, sharp line. No blood seeped out of it, and it wasn’t at all red or irritated. Looking at it, Vanna understood completely why she had ripped herself to pieces the last time she found out she was a Synthuman. She wanted nothing more than to peel off the fake flesh that covered her to find out what else was hiding inside.

She couldn't stand looking at herself for any longer. She threw on the dress Luda had given her and curled up under her blanket, thinking that it would have been better if NEVA had just killed her in the first place.

After hours laying there grieving the loss of her old life and hoping to fall asleep, Vanna heard a knock on her door. She poked her head out from under the blanket, and upon looking out the windows and finding that the sun wasn't even out yet, she went right back under. Whoever it was could wait until daytime. Or another day entirely. Or they could wait forever.

The person knocked again, and was ignored again, until she heard a voice through the door calling out her name. It was Link.

She'd been telling herself that she wanted to be alone, but hearing his voice made a part of her start fighting back. She didn't want to be alone at all. She never did when she was sad. She would always run to her 'mom' or Zi when something was upsetting her, and if they weren't available for some reason, she made do with one of her other friends that she wasn't as close to, but none of those people were options anymore. Link was the closest thing Vanna had to a friend left, and she had never needed a friend more in her life.

Brushing off her fear that he was still mad at her for stealing Epona and he only came to berate her, she got up and opened the door. Link was standing there, wearing only his hat, untucked undershirt, and pants, holding one of his brown pouches in his hand. He didn't look mad. He just looked tired, with that little touch of sadness he hadn't been able to hide since Colin had died.

"I can't sleep," he said.

"Me either," she mumbled.

He nodded toward the room, silently asking to come in. Sighing, she stepped to the side and let him enter. She closed the door as he went to go sit down on the edge of her bed, and then she joined him. Neither of them looked at each other or said anything for a minute.

"...So, Midna told me everything," he said.

Emotions swarmed over Vanna. She was angry at Midna for telling him when it was none of her business to do so, yet relieved that she didn't have to be the one to tell him, and at the same time, she was horrified that he knew the truth. She didn't want anyone to know what she was.

"...I'm not mad at you for stealin' Epona and the things in my pouch," Link went on. "Well. I am, a li'l, but not as much as I was. It was stupid and dangerous for you to take Epona out there without me. You both could've got killed."

"I know," Vanna groaned out. She squeezed her eyes shut and curled her fists. "If you just came here to scold me, then you can leave. I know what I did was stupid and I wish I never would've listened to Midna," Vanna couldn't stop herself from saying her name with all the disdain she felt for her. "She was the one that convinced me to do it, so you can tell her off, not me."

"I'm not here to scold you. I wanted to get that out the way so you'd know I'm here 'cause you're upset, and... I thought maybe you'd wanna talk about it some by now, since neither of us is asleep anyway."

Vanna wasn't sure that she was, or that she ever would be ready to talk about it. "...How much do you know?"

"Midna said she could hear everythin' that man said to you, and she told me all of it. I know you're a robot."

Hearing that word come out of his mouth felt so wrong. "Do you know what that word means? Do you even have them here?"

"What, robots? I know about them. I don't know if we have them anymore, or if we ever truly did, but I've read books that mentioned us having robots in ancient times. My pops even used to read me a story about them when I was a kid. It was one of my favorites," he said. "...You're ... different, though. You're so human."

"But I'm not," Vanna said under her breath. The admission made tears start to prick at her eyes again. "I'm not a person."

"What're you talkin' about? Of course you're—oh."

She wondered how it took her saying it aloud for it to hit him that she wasn't a person like he had assumed she was.

"...Do you remember what I told you in the mines when you said only humans were considered people in your world?" he asked.

She thought back to their conversation. He had told her to be careful around anything that wasn't a person, and that humans, Hylians, Gorons, Zoras, and Fairies were all people in Hyrule. "...You told me about the different kinds of people that exist here." When he didn't respond, she asked, "Why?"

"Don't you realize what I'm saying? You don't have to be a human to be a person."

Vanna rolled her eyes, and she felt a tear start to fall. "Just because there are other people here that aren't humans doesn't mean I'm a person, too. People are born, not created. Pretending that robots are people is crazy. You don't have to lie and pretend you don't care to try to make me feel better. It's not gonna work."

"I'm not lying. I don't care if you're a robot, and I bet our robots counted as people to everyone else who lived back then." The bed squeaked as he repositioned himself, moving closer to her. "Y'know... The last few weeks I've realized there are more people than I ever thought. There are shadow people, and Ooccoo's people, and honestly, I've been thinkin' that animals are people, too. A robot being a person ain't that crazy at all."

After wiping her eyes, Vanna finally got the courage to look at him for the first time since he came in. She supposed he did strike her as the kind of person who would genuinely think that animals and things that were definitely not people counted as people. There wasn't a shred of insincerity to be found in his face. He really didn't care.

She hoped that he wouldn't care about her nearly throwing herself at him for a hug, either. He felt rigid for a second before the tension started to wash away, and he wrapped his arms around her back in return.

"...Feel any better?" he asked.

"A little," she answered, her voice slightly muffled. She sniffled. "I'm happy that you don't care, but I... I think you're out of your mind, and I still don't think I'm a person, but I was never upset just because of that. My life is ruined. I can't go back home, Link. If I do, Mr. Rider will find me no matter where I go, and even if I don't Zi is gonna try to chase me down here so he can bring me back, and if he does Mr. Rider will kill me, so now I'm stuck here and I'm constantly gonna have to be worried about him finding me, and I..." She gulped, before adding in a tiny voice, "I'm scared."

Link seemed to ponder what she said. "...You can stay with me, if you want."

Vanna pulled away and looked at him confusedly. "What, and keep on going with you wherever you go?"

He shrugged. "If you stay in one place, he's gonna find you a whole lot easier."

"I—I don't understand. You're the one that didn't want me to come along with you in the first place because you were worried about my safety, and just hours ago you were mad at me for leaving with Epona for the same reason, but now you want me to go along with you into more dangerous situations?"

"It's different, now. If you're gonna be in danger no matter where you go, I'd rather you be in danger with me than by yourself."

Again, Vanna found herself having conflicting feelings. Even if it would be harder for Zi to find her while traveling with Link, that advantage itself would open up more room for trouble. The temples and monsters inside them could be just as dangerous. Ultimately, she ran the risk of dying either way. She wanted neither, but like with everything else anymore, there could never be a happy medium. It was risking death at the hands of a monster, or risking death at the hands of the man who created her. She just had to decide which one scared her the most so she could go the other way.

It was no wonder Link could see the Light Spirits and she couldn't.

"It was just an offer," Link said after moments of her contemplating it. "You've got some time to think about it. I'm gonna stay in Ordon for a few days, and maybe spend some time here once I'm done there. I wanna make sure Ilia's all right."

She pursed her lips as she realized how much she didn't like the idea of being stuck in the village with just Renado, Luda, Telma, and Barnes at such a time. The thought of Link's presence alone made her feel more at ease. "Can I go with you? Just—just down to Ordon, and back here, at least. I'm not sure yet if I wanna keep traveling with you after that..."

"I was 'bout to ask if you wanted to." Link put a hand on her back and smiled a little bit. "You won't have to worry about Zi if you're with me. I can keep you safe."

Even feeling as awful as she still did, Vanna couldn't help but return his small smile. His offer was touching, and it was exactly what she needed to hear. Just two weeks ago, she would've been offended at his implication that he could protect her better than she could protect herself, even knowing full well that it was probably true, but reality had kicked her pride in the face and she was now beyond the point of turning down help she knew she needed. Zi was 6'6", a whole seventeen inches taller than her, and his legs were practically as long as her body. She wouldn't stand a chance running away from him, and though he had almost no muscle to speak of, she knew without a doubt that she was even weaker, so there was no winning a physical fight against him either. Link, despite barely being taller than her, had strength on his side at least, which could give him a leg up on Zi. If he could wrangle 500-pound goats, he could wrangle someone lucky to be pushing 160.

"So when are we leaving?" Vanna asked.

"I think we should try to get some sleep first, but there's still something I wanna talk to you about. Well, there's a lot I want you to tell me, but for now..." Link grabbed his pouch that he had sat next to him on the bed. "...Midna told me your cut is still open. I got a needle and thread and scissors from Renado. I thought maybe you'd want me to close it up for you...?"

Vanna looked down at her lap, where her wound was hidden under her dress. She wasn't sure if stitching it shut would be a good idea. She remembered Mr. Rider's Synthuman secretary, Synthia, had once accidentally cut her finger and calmly entered his office—not seeming to mind seeing the inside of her robotic finger whatsoever—while Vanna was in there with him. Mr. Rider had put a special type of glue on her, and after he pressed the skin back together, it was almost impossible to tell that she had ever been cut at all.

But there was no running off to Mr. Rider's office to get him to glue a wound shut for her, and she couldn't go on for too long with an open cut on her leg. Sooner or later she would want to take a bath, and she heavily doubted that Mr. Rider would have made her waterproof on the inside with the expectation of water flooding in under her skin.

"It'd be nice if you would," she said. She started to pull her dress up her leg, only to pause an inch before the cut could be seen. Suddenly, she felt hesitant to show it to him, and she hurried to come up with a way to stall the situation while she tried to calm herself. "...Um, actually... D-do you know how to stitch?"

"Yeah. Uli taught me how to, and I got to practice on Talo a few times."

She gave a short hum. It was nice that he was qualified, or as qualified as a person from a tiny village with no school could be—not that that had really factored into her hesitance. Her hesitance was so irrational that she couldn't begin to justify it even to herself. He already knew what she was, so there was no reason to be scared of showing him, yet she still had trouble bringing herself to move her hand.

"Will you promise me something first?" she asked. He nodded. "Please don't tell anyone about any of this."

"Promise."

Chapter Text

After Link left, Vanna attempted to go to sleep. She tossed and turned throughout the night, only to give up when light started to pour in through the windows.

She intended to go outside and pace the village to hopefully calm her frazzled nerves, yet she stopped in her tracks as she grasped the door handle. A sense of dread washed over her, and she couldn't pinpoint why at first. She thought that maybe it was solely out of the irrational fear that Zi would be standing on the porch when she opened the door. He'd told her the new NEVAs were halfway done when she had asked on the 12th, and it was the 15th, so if Mr. Rider's work on them continued to progress at the same rate with no technical difficulties arising, that meant Vanna still had about nine days left before having to worry. Whatever the case, she knew from working with Mr. Rider that things were rarely finished ahead of time, so the chances of him having finished already and her opening the door to Zi were practically nonexistent. She had no reason to be scared yet.

With a jolt, Vanna realized that it wasn't who was potentially outside that was setting off alarms in her head at all. It felt like there was somebody behind her.

Midna's shadowy form was hovering a few feet above the ground when she looked back.

"What do you want?" Vanna nearly growled as she turned to her.

"Link got to talk to you earlier, and now I want to," Midna said.

Vanna crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes. "Unless it's an apology, I don't wanna hear it."

"I'm fresh out of apologies to give, but I have—wait!"

Ignoring Midna's plea for her to wait, she walked outside. Midna followed her, and Vanna came to a stop as she floated right in front of her. Vanna looked down the length of the village, where numerous Gorons were loitering around the buildings.

"The Gorons are gonna look this way and see you," she said.

"Whatever! You can just tell them their eyes were playing tricks on them if they say anything. I have an idea I need to tell you!" Midna said.

Vanna knew Midna wasn't going to stop bugging her until she finally got to tell her whatever her idea was. "What is it?" she asked so indifferently that it didn't sound like a question.

"I've been thinking. You said your bracelet is a 'time-traveling device,' and you wanted it to take you to the past in your world, but instead it brought you to this one..." Midna said. Vanna raised an eyebrow, and she continued. "What if you get it back, and go to your world during a time when the man who wants to kill you either is dead or hasn't been born yet?"

Vanna was surprised that Midna actually had what seemed like a very helpful idea at first thought. Escaping to a different time period in her own world would be a perfect way to avoid him. He would probably make Zi keep searching to the ends of Hyrule's world for her, never having a clue that she had returned to their own world. He would have no idea where, much less when, she was.

At second thought, Vanna realized it was just another scheme to get her to work for Midna.

"How many times do I have to tell you..." Vanna took a step closer to her and glared at her. "I do not owe you. You. Owe. Me."

"Do I reeeaally?" Midna asked.

"Yes! This is all your fault! If it weren't for you, I could be at home right now living my life just like I used to!"

"Yeah, but... Eventually, something would've happened to make you find out what you are, and wouldn't he have killed you immediately since you would've been right there at his fingertips? That already happened once before, didn't it? All of this happening—all of these things you've been complaining about... They've all given you the chance to avoid a worse turn of events, don't you think?"

Vanna had been prepared to tell her off regardless of what she would say, but after Midna finished speaking, she was silent. Midna put things in a light that Vanna never saw them in. She had been so focused on the negatives of showing up in Hyrule that she failed to see the positives, and the positive Midna described was perhaps the most positive of all.

Midna was completely reasonable—helpful, even—and Vanna hated it.

Out of contempt for her, Vanna tried to think of a way that she might have been wrong, but all were marred by uncertainty. Maybe if she'd found out at home, she could've just used her TPort to get far enough away that he could never catch up, and she could've disabled her tracking chip to make it even harder; or maybe she would've been with Daina, who would never let anybody take her away from her in a million years. Every one of the few scenarios she could think of started with maybe. As much as she wished things didn't have to be the way they really were, at least she knew with certainty that she had a chance. How much of a chance she had was unbeknownst to her, but it was a chance nonetheless.

She looked down at her feet, curling up her fists. "You might be right..." Vanna quietly admitted. "But that doesn't mean I owe you."

"Your loss. I was just trying to give you a little more incentive to go along with Link, since he wants you to."

"Yeah, I'm sure that's really what this is all about," she said, rolling her eyes. "Just know that if I do decide to go along with him, it won't be out of debt to you."

"That's okay. I'll accept it as payment for your debt even if you pretend that it's not. Isn't that so nice of me?" Midna said with a giggle.

With one final eye roll, Vanna turned and started walking away from her again. She decided on going to the secret alcove at the back of the graveyard, thinking that she'd feel weird pacing the village while the Gorons were standing around. She felt weird about hanging out around a graveyard, too, but at least it was nice and secluded. Once she was back there, she relaxed against the earthen wall. The alcove wasn't quite as pretty as it was at night time with the waterfalls no longer glowing, but it remained the most scenic place she'd ever seen with her own eyes. The springs in Faron and Ordon were quite close to holding that title, which made her glad about the prospect of going back down. She'd have relaxing places to go to attempt to clear her mind.

She knew that making a decision of whether to go along with Link or not would be hard, but it felt harder now that there was more to consider. Even if she decided on going with Link, she wouldn't know about going to her home in a different time upon getting NEVA back. If she did, then she had to decide on the past or future. The past opened up possibilities for paradoxes, while she had no idea at all what life in the future would be like. Wherever she would stay, she'd have to relearn how to live her life, and for all she knew, living in the past or future of her world could be worse than living in Hyrule and being on the run from Zi.

Soon enough, Vanna felt like she had thoroughly contemplated every aspect of her dilemma, yet she still felt so far from being able to make a decision. It all needed to start with the one decision she had realized she'd need to make the night before: would she rather die at the hands of a monster, or at the hands of Mr. Rider?

She was continuing to weigh her options and potential outcomes when she heard Link say her name. Her eyes opened quickly and she looked around, but he wasn't in the alcove. She leaned over and looked through the hole she had crawled in through, finding Link crouched down on the opposite end.

"Are we leaving?" she asked.

Once he nodded, Vanna crawled out, and they left the graveyard together in silence. Link ended up mounting Telma's horse and leaving his to Vanna, presumably because he thought she wouldn't want to ride a horse with a wagon behind it. She almost wished he would have just let her ride Telma's horse as she struggled to get up on the much-taller Epona. She heard movement behind her, and then she felt hands grasp her sides and lift her up. Embarrassed, she quietly thanked Link as she settled onto Epona, and once he was back on Telma's horse, they were off.

As soon as they were out of Kakariko, Midna popped up and floated along with them between the horses' heads. "So," she said enthusiastically, "I gave Vanna a great idea earlier, Link! Vanna, why don't you tell him it?"

Link looked at Vanna expectantly. "Midna just gave me more options, really," she said. "If I go along with you and she gets my bracelet back, I could go back home, but either in the past or future where Mr. Rider couldn't find me, instead of staying in Hyrule. But I still don't know if I'm even going with you or not, so..."

"But you know he really wants you to," Midna said in a sing-song voice.

"It's up to you. I don't wanna force you to do anything you don't want," Link said. "But... If you do stay, but not with me ... could you maybe stay with Ilia? If her memory doesn't come back during her time in Ordon, Renado wants her to stay in Kakariko under his care until it does... I don't want her to be so alone."

Vanna felt a pang of misplaced jealousy just hearing how tenderly he spoke of Ilia, and she mentally berated herself for it. She never had a reason to feel so stupidly jealous before, but now she absolutely didn't. Even the craziest person who believed robots were people wouldn't want to actually be with one. She had no chance at all—not with him, not with anyone, and that realization hurt more than any of them. All of her hopes and dreams for a normal future had been stolen from her.

She simply nodded and looked back to the way they were headed. "I was planning on staying in Kakariko anyway if I did decide to stay. There's already that empty house I've been staying in there."

"Well, if Ilia gets better and you change your mind, my offer for you to stay in my house is still open."

She merely shook her head out of disbelief. "You're too nice. I don't get it," she said quietly.

"Why not? Are you planning on robbing me after all?" he said, sarcastic but light.

"No, it's just... We don't even know each other all that well, and you're still nice to me."

"That's how it's supposed to be. You're nice to people until they give you a reason not to be nice."

Vanna pursed her lips. Given his circumstances, it made sense that he was so trusting from the start. He hadn't been raised in a place where you had to keep your house on lockdown for fear of being robbed, where you had no choice but to be initially distrustful because of the criminals and objectionable people that lurked around every corner. His home was nice, and so he was nice. Jersey never allowed her to have the same naivety that Ordon allowed him; and even ignoring all of that, she was the one with the overbearing mother that barely let her out of her sight. Since day one, Vanna was made to be wary of the world around her and all of its potential dangers.

"...And, I think we do know each other fairly well," he said. "Especially now that I know about your ... er, predicament."

She wasn't sure how much she agreed with that. She knew that he was a seventeen-year-old from Ordon Village whose parents had died when he was eight; he was a left-handed swordsman with magical abilities that wrangled goats and rode a horse; he was good at sumo wrestling and he knew how to backflip; his best friend was Ilia; he loved kids and kids loved him back; he hadn't even met thirty people in his life; he needed glasses, read a lot of books, slept a lot, and never went to school; he believed that the world was created by three Goddesses... When Vanna mentally recounted it all like that, it seemed like a decent amount of knowledge about him, but some of the most basic things were missing from that list. She didn't even know his last name or his favorite color.

Knowing that he still had questions about her 'predicament,' she thought she had found the perfect opportunity to distract herself from her racing thoughts and to keep the spotlight off her, so she wouldn't have to try to give him answers to questions that she wasn't even sure of herself.

"Link?" she said.

"Hm?"

"What's your full name? Lincoln...?"

He gave her a weird look. "Link's not short for anything."

That was fair enough. People often thought Vanna was short for Savanna or Giovanna or something when it wasn't. "Okay, then. What's your last name?"

"My name is Link," he said slowly. "That's it."

"Really? No middle name, no last name? Just ... Link?" she said.

"Just Link," he affirmed.

"But what if multiple people named their kids Link?"

"Ordon's too small for that to happen."

"What if there was another Link living in Hyrule, then?"

He shrugged. "'Link of Ordon' would do just fine. There's no need for parents to give their kids three names. That kinda stuff is just for royalty. I think Princess Zelda's got three. I don't get it."

"Three might be a bit much, since middle names aren't that important, but it's crazy that you don't at least have a last name to trace your family with."

"What's the point of having middle names if they're not that important?"

"More differentiation between people, for starters, but also a lot of the time they're names of people in your family to 'honor' them. Like, my..." Vanna tensed up, "...dad's name was Lee, and my middle name is Lee."

It was strange, thinking about Lee. The entire reason she was here in the first place was because she'd wanted to stop him from dying, to make her family whole again ... and now she knew that her family wasn't even truly hers.

"Hm... What's your last one?" Link asked.

"Meadows." She hated saying it, now. It only tied her to her fake parents.

"So, you're Vanna Lee Meadows."

Impulsively, she said, "No, I'm not."

"What? You just said..."

"The real Vanna Lee Meadows is dead," she said. "I'm just Vanna, like how you're just Link."

Part of her wanted a new first name, too, now that she knew she wasn't the real Vanna, but she couldn't just let it go, not when she had always known herself as Vanna first and foremost. She had already lost enough of her old life in the past twenty-four hours.

"That'll help you fit in more, so that's good," Midna chimed in.

"It'll help me if I stay."

"You should," she muttered under her breath before retreating back into the shadows.

Vanna sighed and looked over at Link. "...What's your favorite color?"

Majority of their ride was spent asking and answering trivial questions. Vanna was expecting Link's questions to eventually morph into queries about her predicament, but it looked like he picked up that she wasn't exactly in the mood to talk more about that. He seemed pleased enough finally getting to ask her just what exactly 'Zelda games' were, though her answer only served to confuse him more before he resigned to the idea that he would never quite wrap his head around it. Around the time they got to where Hyrule Field ended and the densely wooded Faron began, their horses slowed their pace without instruction, as if they knew they were nearing their destination. Link, too, had a change in demeanor the closer they got to Ordon. It seemed that Colin's quickly-approaching funeral reinvigorated everything Link had felt when he first learned of the boy's death, and he seemed right back to the way he had been.

As they passed by Ordon's Spirit's Spring, Vanna noticed that Ilia was sitting in front of the water, absentmindedly running her fingers through the sand. Ilia turned and glanced up at them for the brief moment they were visible in front of the open gates, but said nothing. Vanna decided that she would go to her after getting off Epona and give her the chance she deserved. Besides that, she knew Ilia would be the only one in the village not busy grieving Colin given that she had no memory of him, and she didn't want to intrude on everyone else's time of mourning.

They came to a stop just outside Link's house—the wagon was too wide to make it through to the main part of the village—and Vanna told him of her intention to go see Ilia. He nodded, not making any eye contact or sound at all. She tossed her leg over and slid off Epona, and she walked off after regaining her balance. When she was back outside of the spring, she paused at the gate. Ilia didn't appear to have heard her coming back. Vanna knocked on the gate to get her attention, and Ilia looked up again.

Ilia gave her a little grin. "You didn't have to knock. You can come in."

Vanna walked to her, quickly glancing over to the empty alcove where she had met up with the Hero's Shade numerous times and pondering where he went when he vanished. She sat down on her legs next to Ilia. Ilia looked at her, her eyes the most pure green color that almost seemed to sparkle in the daylight.

It was suddenly like she was truly seeing Ilia for the first time, and she was startled by how much she looked like her friend from home, Maddie. The short blonde hair, the wide-set green eyes, the elfin nose, the plump top lip, the small chin... They easily could've passed as sisters, and nearly could've passed as twins, ignoring that Ilia was a foot shorter and all around more petite. Now that she saw the similarities, it baffled her how she hadn't noticed them right away. Her only guess was that she had been too blinded by her unreasonable jealousy before. Finding herself able to see better through it now, Vanna thought that Ilia was, admittedly, kind of cute, just like Maddie was. They both had a unique appeal, but an appeal nonetheless.

"So, uh..." Vanna cleared her throat. "How are you doing? Memory back yet?"

Ilia shook her head and frowned, looking down at her fingers. "No. I thought that being back in my home village would bring up something, but... I don't remember any of this place or any of these people at all."

"Well... Maybe you just need more time to see everything?" Vanna offered. She wondered if Ilia felt as awkward as she did.

Ilia sighed. "My ... father, tried showing me things and telling me all about my life, but nothing rung any bells. I'm not sure what else can be done besides waiting... But everyone is expecting me to just suddenly remember, and it's only making me feel worse when I don't. I know they only want the best for me, but... It feels like nobody gets how hard this is on me. It hurts me that everyone looks at me and sees someone they know, only for me to look back at them and see strangers."

Something Mr. Rider had said hit Vanna abruptly. He'd told her that when she tore herself apart, he powered her back up after wiping her memories again. That little word had slipped right past her in her panicked state, and it was only now that she realized he had even said it. Something else had to have happened that he didn't tell her about, and realizing it only made her more furious. Knowing only that she tore herself apart and that her memories were really wiped twice was not enough to satisfy her. She deserved to know what else had happened to her—but unlike Ilia, she had nobody who could at least try to fill in the gaps of her life for her.

"...Are you okay?" Ilia asked.

Vanna blinked, coming back to her senses, her vision focusing on Ilia again. "Fine. I just... I just realized something. Sorry."

"...Something to do with me?"

"No, nothing to do with you, really. Talking about memories—it reminded me of something, that's all."

"Oh. Speaking of that... Did I know you beforehand, as well?"

"No. The other night was the first time we met. I'm not from Ordon."

"Ah, that's nice. That makes me feel better about not knowing your name," Ilia said, smiling. "What is it?"

She paused involuntarily. "It's—um, Vanna."

"Nice to properly meet you, Vanna. My name's Ilia, but I guess you probably figured that when that little girl kept calling me Ilia the other night, didn't you?"

She just nodded, even though she'd figured out that she was Ilia even before then. "So, what were you doing out here?"

Ilia looked toward the spring, and up into the trees that surrounded it. "Praying. I was told that a Light Spirit resides in this spring, and that everyone was praying here for the children's and my safety. I thought it wouldn't hurt to pray for my memory back."

Not wanting to crush her dreams, Vanna bit her tongue and decided not to say anything about how the Light Spirits, if they truly existed, didn't like to listen very much. Despite all the prayers, Ilia still lost her memory, and above all, a child was dead.

"What about you?" Ilia asked, peeking back over at her.

Vanna shrugged and looked to the spring like she did. "I have to make a really big decision soon, and it's weighing down on me. I came here to relax."

"...If you don't mind me asking, what are you trying to decide?"

For a moment, Vanna considered making up a lie, or avoiding an answer altogether, but she chose vagueness instead. "I have to decide if I'm going along with somebody on a dangerous mission to help save the world, or if I'm going to settle down somewhere that I'm in danger. Those are my only choices."

"And they're both equally as dangerous?"

"Basically."

Ilia hummed. "Well... If I were you, I think I'd go on the mission."

Vanna's eyebrows drew together, and she looked at her. That wasn't the answer she would have expected from someone reared in a tiny farming village, one with memory loss or not. "Why?"

Ilia looked back at her, almost as confused as she was. "To save the world, of course. And not only to save it, but to see it. This world..." Ilia's vision returned to their surroundings once more, "...it's so beautiful, isn't it?"

Like her, Vanna again took in the scenery. It really was beautiful—more beautiful than anywhere she had ever seen back home. She had seen more monotone buildings reaching up into a polluted sky than anyone would ever wish for. Maybe she could get used to breathing fresh air and taking in all the new experiences this world had to offer.

There were still more places to go, people to talk to, bravery to be gained and Light Spirits to be seen. Hiding in a shack would bring her nothing.

'If I'm going to die,' she thought, 'I might as well die trying to defend a beautiful world and its innocent inhabitants.'

Chapter Text

It was September 19th when they were preparing to leave Ordon Village for Kakariko. Though Vanna knew her estimate was rough and unreliable, she couldn't stop herself from counting down the days she had left before she had to officially start worrying about Zi's arrival. She had at least five days left—but that didn't stop her from worrying in the meantime. She had spent most of her days in Ordon sitting at the spring or with the goats, frequently checking behind her, and her nights were spent staring into the dark at the vague outline of Link's door, listening to hear if the locked knob rattled. Only when she was around others—conscious others—did she feel she could let her guard down, but she was alone more than she would have liked. Link spent nearly all of his time with the mourning townspeople, and the only non-mourning person Vanna could have spent time with, except Midna, was Ilia, who couldn't get away from her father for too long.

"Vanna...?"

Her eyes snapped away from whatever she had been unknowingly staring at and made contact with Link's. He was still frowning, just like she'd gotten used to seeing, but he looked mostly concerned, not just hurt.

"You all right?" he asked.

She nodded and picked up some bread off her neglected breakfast plate. "I'm fine."

"You've barely been eatin' food since we got here..." he said. She took a bite as if to prove him wrong, though she knew they both knew he was right. "...And I don't think you've gotten any sleep, either, have you?"

Vanna looked down at her plate, her fingers playing around with the food she couldn't bring herself to eat. "No. I just... I can't. It's like—every time I close my eyes, I picture Zi sneaking up on me and taking me home, and then Mr. Rider..." She sighed. "But I'm fine. Really. I stopped being hungry and tired days ago. I just wish I could sleep instead of having to be awake all the time..."

"If you say so," Link said, sounding unconvinced. He finished the last bite left on his plate. "Made your decision yet? You've had a lot of time to think since you've been awake."

"I did the first day we got here, I just haven't really had the chance to tell you."

He looked surprised for a second, and his frown didn't return afterward. "Oh. What'd you choose?"

She hesitated, knowing that telling him her answer would finalize it. "...I'm going with you, at least for now. Once I get my bracelet back, I might leave after a while if I feel like Zi is making my life too difficult when he gets here, but I guess we'll just have to see about that..."

Midna emerged from Vanna's shadow then. "Good choice! You know that you could get your bracelet back after we beat Lakebed Temple and get that last Fused Shadow, though, right? And if you get back to work quick, then that could be as early as tomorrow."

"I know, but I wanna stay a bit longer just to see more of the world, and that'll give me more time to make my final decision," Vanna said.

"Wait, are you two going back to the temple again without me?" Link asked.

"There's only one pair of that armor, and Vanna knows I'm not giving her her bracelet back if she doesn't help out, so..." Midna said.

Vanna gave Midna a quick glare. "Actually... I think we should only need one pair of the armor for us to go to the temple."

They both looked at her curiously. Rather than explain herself with words, she decided to show them something she had realized she was capable of. She closed her mouth tightly before plugging her nose with her fingers. Pressure slowly began to build up in her chest, and it started to become painful around the thirty second mark. The pain reached a high before it suddenly stopped hurting, and then she felt fine. Even though her chest wasn't rising and falling as normal, she felt normal, like there was nothing physically wrong with the fact that she wasn't breathing at all. Mentally, on the other hand, she was still just as freaked out as when she'd first tested her theory. It was the strangest, most unnatural thing, to not breathe and feel no negative consequences of it.

It seemed to take them both some time to notice that Vanna wasn't breathing, then a few seconds longer for them to realize the implications. By the time the pain had settled, Link looked amazed, while Midna just looked amused. Midna started to laugh, and Vanna allowed herself to breathe again.

"So you've been terrified of drowning this whole time when you don't even need air anyway?" Midna said.

"Better that you found that out now than never. Least now we can go together so I ain't gotta worry about you getting kidnapped and me not being able to do anything about it," Link said. He stood up from his chair. "Reminds me..."

He walked over to his bookshelf and started to pull some of the thinner books out to check their covers before sliding them back into their spots. He eventually found what he wanted and pulled it out completely, and then he brought it over to Vanna. The last word on the red cover caught her eye first. It looked like Pabats, but she immediately knew that it said Robots. It took her longer to decipher the middle word as Ancient.

"The Ancient Robots," she read aloud.

"Not sure how factual the events are since it's a children's book and all... But I thought you might like to see it. It's about robots and humans working together to mine materials and build things, and fight off evil robots."

She opened it up. On the pastedown was a drawing of a Hylian man and a peanut-shaped thing with a wonky face, a sort of pirate hat, and giant three-fingered hands connected to the peanut body by squiggly lines.

"That's what the robots here looked like?" she asked. It was no wonder Link seemed wowed by how human she looked.

"If that book's got it right, then most of 'em, yeah. The evil ones later in the book look more human. Not as much as you, though," Link said. "I'm gonna go ahead and get Ilia and say bye to everyone. I'll yell for you to come out when we're ready to leave."

Vanna simply nodded in response, and he walked out. Unfortunately for her, Midna didn't slip into his shadow and leave with him, instead staying floating in the air where she was. Vanna hoped that if she didn't look at Midna then she wouldn't try to converse with her, so she focused on reading the book. 'A long ... ying? No, time ago, in the desert...'

Midna cleared her throat.

'...there was a p-H-c-e ... oh, race of people called the Ancient Robots. ...People? The peanut robots? Maybe it's not just Link. Everyone from Hyrule must be crazy...'

Midna cleared her throat again, louder this time.

Vanna groaned and slammed the book down. "Oh my god, what do you want?"

"I just have a question, is all."

"No."

"You don't even know if it's a yes or no question!"

Vanna sighed. "What is it?"

"We're leaving for Lakebed Temple tomorrow morning. Do you think you could convince Link to come with us then, or do we have to go by ourselves again?"

"He just said we're going together."

"But he didn't specify a time. He said a few days ago that he was considering staying with Ilia in Kakariko Village awhile after they would get back from here. I'm tired of waiting around. It's been almost three weeks, and we've still only got two out of three Fused Shadows."

"If you wanna go so bad tomorrow, then you convince him," Vanna said.

"He wouldn't listen to me back when he first found the kids in Kakariko Village and I was trying to get him out of there! If there's one thing he won't budge on, it's staying with those friends of his for as long as he can..."

"So what makes you think he'll listen to me?"

"You can tell him you're worried about your safety hanging around in such an empty village where you'd be easy to spot. How's that Zi guy gonna make it inside of an underwater temple without the Zora armor?"

Vanna gulped. Monsters and all, the temple did seem safer. Even if Zi managed to get in there, either via teleportation or some other means, which didn't seem likely to happen, the layout of the temple was sprawling and confusing enough that he probably wouldn't be able to find her anyway.

"Guess I'll try," she said.

When a satisfied Midna dove back into her shadow, Vanna picked up the book and started reading it again. The only good thing about her not being entirely literate in Hylian was the fact that having to pay close attention to every individual letter made reading a great distraction from her thoughts. She was only about halfway through the short book when Link called for her from outside. She carried it out with her, planning to put it in the wagon since she had left her magic pouch in Kakariko Village.

She was surprised to find that Ilia wasn't the only person getting into the wagon. Beth, Talo, and Malo were all coming along.

"What's up with all of this?" Vanna said to Link.

He picked up Malo and helped him get in. "The kids managed to convince their parents to let them go back to Kakariko."

"What? Why...?"

"They all want to be with Ilia to help her get her memory back, but Beth also wants to keep the Zora Prince company, Talo wants to stand guard there to make sure everyone gets to safety if more Bulblins show up, and Malo wants to, uh..."

"Run my business," Malo said from inside the wagon.

"Apparently the four-year-old is running a business," Link mumbled.

"Oookay, then..." Vanna said. "Um, before we go, can I ask you something?" Link nodded, and she asked her question quietly. "Can we go to the temple in the morning?"

Link looked inside the wagon quickly, then back to her. "Any reason you wanna leave so soon...?"

She frowned and shrugged. "I'm just worried about Zi... There aren't many good places for me to hide in Kakariko, but I don't think he could get into the temple. I know you really love the kids and all, but... I'd love to not be kidnapped and murdered."

"Okay," Link said with a nod. "If you think you'd be safer, then we'll go in the morning."

"That'll be 300 Rupees."

Vanna's jaw dropped. As soon as they had gotten back to Kakariko, Malo had gone into the shop near the entrance of the village that she had seen him go into before, and early the following morning she had gone inside. He'd told her, quite rudely, that if she wanted something, she was to buy it, even though it was an unmanned shop that he had merely decided to take over. When Vanna had expressed interest in the shield and binoculars on display—she thought it'd be best if she and Link both had their own metal shields rather than one of them having to settle for the smaller wooden one, and the binoculars would have been handy for Link—she was hoping that maybe Malo would say he was just joking about the whole situation.

Apparently not.

"Okay, look, I have no idea what the value of any amount of Rupees means in Hyrule, but that seems like a lot of money to be asking for merchandise that was never yours in the first place," Vanna said.

"So I take it you don't have the money," Malo said.

"No, but—"

"The door is behind you."

"Are you kidding me? This isn't even your shop! You can't just walk into an abandoned shop and say everything in it is yours!"

"Didn't you walk into that abandoned house and say it's yours?"

Her jaw dropped again, and she struggled to find a way to make herself not seem like a hypocrite. "D-don't you turn this around on me! That's totally different!"

"Tell you what, I'll give you a special deal just this once to commemorate the grand opening of Malo Mart," he said. "...299 Rupees."

She should have thought ahead and stolen the stupid shield and binoculars while he wasn't in there. She considered just hopping over the counter and grabbing them—what was he gonna do, bite her ankle?—but she left instead, planning to ask Link if he could get Malo to give him them for free before setting off. He had been in the Elde Inn eating breakfast when Vanna had left for the shop. When she got back, he was finished eating, and he had his arms crossed on the table with his head resting on them. She walked over and tapped him on the shoulder, and he raised his head and wiped at his eyes as he yawned. Seeing him so sleepy made Vanna start to feel tired for the first time in days.

"You wanna go now?" he asked.

"Yeah, but I want you to go to 'Malo Mart' first and see if you can grab some things," she said. "I couldn't get Malo to give me what I wanted..."

He stood up, raising an eyebrow. "What kinda stuff does he got in there already?"

As they left the Elde Inn, Vanna explained to Link the things Malo had in the store and why she wanted them. He also thought that it was a good idea to get them before going, but he said he didn't have the money, either, since his job as a wrangler didn't pay all that well. Still, he agreed to attempt to coax Malo into lowering the price, or at least letting him pay later, hoping that his close relationship with Malo might work in their favor.

It didn't, and they left with no binoculars and the two shields they'd already had in the first place.

Before they mounted Epona, Link stashed his sword and shield into his pouch, which made riding behind him a lot more comfortable than it had been the last time. Without thinking about it, Vanna ended up resting her head against his back and closing her eyes. Neither the hard material of the saddle beneath them nor the way they bounced on it was enough to stop her from starting to doze off. What did, however, stop her dozing from turning into sleeping was the feel of something small and cold hitting her cheek.

Her eyes blinked open, and just as they did, another something managed to fall right into one of them. It took her a moment to realize that it had been a raindrop. More and more started to come down, and in no time, it was absolutely pouring, so hard that each of the droplets stung as they hit her. She tilted her head down as much as she could behind Link to minimize the amount that could smack against her skin. It was annoying that they were going to have to be soaking and cold before even getting inside the temple, but a part of her was relieved that the rain had stopped her from falling asleep against Link. She felt embarrassed enough that she had basically been cuddling up to his back for that short amount of time.

The rain continued to pound down for the rest of their lengthy ride to the lake, effectively being a sleep deterrent for Vanna. She was relieved when they made it down to the bank where the overhanging walls around the lake protected them from the rain.

"Can I have the Zora armor?" Link asked.

After she managed to retrieve all of its components from her pouch, Link went into a large, dark tunnel to get dressed. Vanna decided to change out of the outfit Luda had given her and wear the outfit she'd been wearing when she got to Hyrule, along with with the pants she'd borrowed from Uli, figuring that would be easier to swim in than a knee-length dress. A minute passed after she had finished getting changed and Link still hadn't come back out, so she assumed he was having trouble figuring out how to wear the pieces just like she had.

She went ahead and got into the water to mentally prepare herself for what was coming. The water felt much colder than it had the last time, though she wasn't sure if it was because it was actually colder or because she wasn't wearing the wetsuit. Either way, it was miserable—but she reminded herself that not having to go through the temple alone was worth the price of freezing her ass off.

Holding her breath, Vanna fully submerged herself in the water, and she encountered something she hadn't considered. She had no idea how to stop water from going up her nose, other than to hold it with her fingers, and that would make it even harder for her to swim than it already was. She knew that swimmers were somehow capable of doing it, but it was something she never learned how to do as someone who always avoided going completely underwater. While contemplating about it, a thought crossed her mind: if she had fake lungs that didn't truly need oxygen, it wouldn't matter if they filled with water either, right?

Vanna let go of her nose and let the water flood inside to test her idea. An uncomfortable feeling of fullness built up in her chest, but she didn't feel like she was dying, at least—it was almost more uncomfortable mentally, just like it was when it had hit her that she didn't need air in the first place. Such a perk should have made her happy, but it being such a blatant reminder that she wasn't human just left her filled with an overwhelming sense of dread.

She saw something from the bottom of the lake that looked to be swimming closer to her, and she realized it was a Zora. She surfaced so she'd be able to talk better and coughed all of the water out. The Zora's head popped up out of the water not long after hers. Vanna couldn't tell right away if it was one of the ones she'd seen the previous week or not.

"Oh! Hero! Is it really you?!" the Zora said. Apparently, it was one of the ones Vanna had seen. Now that they were above water and Vanna could both see and hear the Zora better, she was reasonably confident it was female.

Vanna glanced over to the tunnel that Link still hadn't come out of. "Yeah, it's me. The Hero."

"I thought those were your eyes! You're no longer wearing the Zora armor, so I had to ask to be sure." She tilted her head. "You're female?"

'You're one to talk,' Vanna thought. "Surprise?"

She smiled, giving Vanna a good look at her pointy teeth. "It is a bit of a surprise! The Hero was described as a Hylian male in our legends, and... You're not even Hylian, are you? Ah, but, it's no matter—legends don't always play out how they're told. What matters is that you made it out of the temple alive! We didn't see you come out, so we assumed the worst. How was it?"

"I didn't see as many monsters as I expected, but I'm still not done in there. I'm going back and finishing up."

Just then, Link walked out of the tunnel fully geared up. The armor fit him much better than it had fit Vanna, so he was able to wear the pieces she couldn't. Looking at him, she realized that if the thigh armor had fit her, the lizard thing wouldn't have been able to cut her leg and send her life into an intense downward spiral. She couldn't help but wonder how different things would have turned out if she only had been able to wear it.

"Who is this wearing your garb?" the Zora asked.

"That's my friend that I'm taking with me inside the temple. I'm allowing him to wear the outfit," Vanna said.

"But what about you, Hero? You're not a Zora, you can't survive underwater without it!"

Vanna reached up above the water and dismissively waved her hand. "I'll be fine. Hero powers, you know..."

She didn't look like she believed Vanna. "I hope so. I will be praying for your safety."

"Thanks," Vanna muttered. Those prayers were going to do nothing to help them.

The Zora bowed her head and went back underwater, and Vanna looked over to Link.

"I kind of already lied to them when I first came here and said I was the Hero so they'd let me in," she explained. "Sorry for stealing your thunder."

"It's all good, Hero," Link said, grinning. He got in the water and swam over to her. "Guess you can lead me to the temple, since I'm your sidekick for today."

She swam farther out into the lake with Link beside her until they were above the entrance to the temple to minimize the amount of time she'd have to spend underwater, and then she pulled out the iron boots from her pouch. Once they were on her feet, Vanna started sinking faster than Link could swim downward. She came to a stop at the bottom of the lake, and she had already taken the boots off and put them away before Link caught up with her.

Since the opening of the tunnel leading inside the temple was so small, Link had to swim in first, and Vanna followed the light that shone from the pendant he wore. As they got to the part where the tunnel went up toward the end, she realized that perhaps it was for the better that they couldn't get that second metal shield from Malo. She hadn't been thinking about the giant jellyfish swimming near the end of the tunnel. If her bones were made of metal and she had a metal sword on her, then she already had to be highly conductive; it was bad enough that Link already had his own metal shield and sword, and adding yet another a metal shield to the mix would have made things even worse. It made her worry for his sake. From experience, she knew that she could handle being shocked by the jellyfish, but she didn't know how bad it could be for him.

Link swam up by himself, not even noticing that she stayed behind at the bottom until he was already practically out of the tunnel. She waved her arm to urge him to go ahead out, and she didn't start to swim up until he got the message. Vanna remembered getting shocked the last time she went through the tunnel, and how it had been because she was looking down at the jellyfish lower in the tunnel as she continued to swim upward, so she decided that this time she wouldn't look back at all. She passed the first one with no problem, and as she swam closer to the side of the tunnel opposite the jellyfish that had stung her before, she thought that she was in the clear—until it suddenly decided to propel itself closer to her and started generating electricity before she had time to react.

Vanna could just barely hear Link yell from above the water. She wanted so badly to scream for him to pull her out, but she couldn't speak, and she knew that realistically things would have been worse if he touched her anyway. What felt like an eternity later, the jellyfish let up, and she started swimming again as fast as she could. Link reached into the water and helped get her out, and she coughed out as much water as she could.

"Are you okay?!" Link asked.

"I'm fine," Vanna said, voice high. She turned her head away from him and wiped at her eyes. Since she got to Hyrule she'd been crying more often than she ever did before, and it made her feel like such a loser—and crying in front of him made it even worse. "It—it happened last time, too..."

Link was silent for minutes while Vanna sat there crying from the pain, and all she could think of was how little he had to think of her.

"...Do you wanna go to sleep?" he gently asked. "It always makes me feel better..."

"What about—what about monsters?" she said.

"There are none in this room, and even if some end up coming in here, I'll kill 'em. And you said yourself Zi probably can't get in here... But I'll take care of him too if he does. You're completely safe. You can finally get some sleep."

She heard shuffling from his direction, and when she peeked over, he was going through his pouch. He pulled out his green tunic and walked farther back from the water, then folded his tunic up and laid it on the ground. He looked at her and patted it.

"Not much of a pillow, but it's better than the hard floor," he said.

Out of pure stubbornness, Vanna initially wanted to decline his offer, but just imagining herself going to sleep made it so tempting. She walked over and lay down with her head on the makeshift pillow, and she closed her eyes.

"Goodnight, Vanna."

Chapter Text

After Vanna woke up, things happened in a blur. They had trouble finding their way through Lakebed Temple because it seemed like every door they opened led to the same area as the last. It didn't help that Vanna had already completed a chunk of the temple. Her memory of the layout was so hazy that she couldn't remember where she'd left off, only that she had already been in the temple, and the map that she'd gotten before had succumbed to water damage and was left an incomprehensible mess.

Finally, they got to the room where she'd left off, a room that she remembered very clearly—the room with the lizard thing on top of the sideways gear high above the ground. This time, the lizard thing wasn't there, but rather some other type of enemy she'd never seen before. It almost looked like a conglomeration of a lizard thing and a Bulblin, but for some reason Vanna couldn't get a good enough look at it to really make out many details. Link told her not to worry, that he would take care of it. She stood by the door and watched with worry as Link engaged in a battle with the monster.

All seemed to be going well until the monster managed to stab its sword right through Link's midsection. The color drained from Link's face as the monster laughed and pulled its sword out, letting blood gush out of him. It sliced through a paralyzed Link again, and again, and again, until there was more of Link covered in blood than not. With one final, powerful swing of its sword, the monster sent Link falling off of the gear, and Vanna watched with horror as Link's body slammed into the ground far below.

Her body jolted and her eyes snapped open.

She sat upright quickly and looked around the room. She was all alone, back in the room she had fallen asleep in earlier. Her thoughts were swirling. Link died, then all of a sudden, she was back here?

...Link died. Link died.

As the words rung through Vanna's mind, tears welled up in her eyes, and her heart pounded heavily in her chest. She buried her head in her hands as she started to hyperventilate.

She didn't know what to do without him. Link was supposed to go through all of the temples. Link was supposed to defeat Ganondorf at the end. Link was supposed to save everyone. This world needed him. She needed him.

And she'd let him die. He was dead because of her.

She'd sentenced this whole world to doom, all because she'd stood on the sidelines in fear.

"Vanna, what's wrong?"

She moved her hands down and looked at where the voice had come from. Link was walking out from behind one of the columns that surrounded the circular room.

She was so confused that all she could do was sit there and stare. He didn't have that phantasmal look to him like Colin's ghost did, so she was sure he wasn't a ghost—but how could he have possibly been standing there? She'd watched him die.

Link walked over and crouched down in front of her. "Hello? Anybody home?" he said, snapping his fingers in front of her face.

"What—what happened?" Vanna choked out. "How'd you get back here?!"

"Uh... What?" he chuckled.

"What do you mean 'what'?! You got stabbed and you fell like a hundred feet! You died!"

"Vanna, that... None of that stuff happened."

"Yes it did! I saw it! I was standing right there, and you—"

"Everything is fine," Link said, reaching over and grabbing her shoulders. He smiled, the sort of comforting smile you give to a scared child to calm them. "It was just a bad dream, and you're awake now."

A bad dream... She had been dreaming?

"I've... I've never dreamt before," she said.

Link's eyebrows raised. "Never?"

"Never."

"Well, you have now, because I promise you it was a dream. You fell asleep while I was sitting right next to you, and I just went up to go to the toilet, and then you woke up."

"But it felt so real..." Vanna said with a frown.

"They do, sometimes." He patted her shoulders and let go of her. "Do you wanna go back to sleep for a while? It's only been a couple hours."

"No... I don't think I'll be able to get back to sleep, and besides, you'd probably be tired and wanna go to sleep yourself by the time I'd wake up."

"You sure?" he asked.

"I'm sure."

They both stood up, and as Link stashed away his green tunic into his pouch, Vanna pulled out her bow and quiver from hers and slung them over her shoulder. She wished that she could have had more time to sleep, but she believed what she'd said; there was no way she was getting back to sleep, not with the image of Link's mutilated body lying lifeless on the ground stuck in her head.

Something he had said sunk in suddenly as they started to walk to the door. "...There's a toilet in here?"

"There is now."

"Ew!" she said, playfully smacking his arm.

He laughed—an actual, real laugh. Vanna had heard chuckles out of him, but nothing like that before. It made her laugh, too, and she realized that it was the first time she had since finding out she was a Synthuman. It felt inappropriate to be laughing over something so juvenile in the circumstance they were in, but it was the perfect thing to break the tension that had been hanging over both of them for weeks.

"You two are such children," Midna said. "No wonder you get along with the village kids so well..."

At her comment, it came to Vanna's awareness that she still didn't know how old Midna was. She had a very high-pitched voice and very tiny body, but that tiny body of hers had enough curves that Vanna knew she couldn't have been a child, at least, whether she was a member of a strange shadow race or not. Maybe she was fifteen or so, Vanna guessed. She had the attitude of a fifteen-year-old girl, for sure.

"Midna, how old are you?" she asked.

"Nineteen. Older than both of you. Especially you, now, since you're really only three, aren't you?"

Vanna's pace slowed. In the technical sense, Midna was right—but in any sense that mattered, she couldn't have been more wrong.

"It doesn't matter if my physical body was only created three years ago. I don't act like a three-year-old, I don't think like a three-year-old, and I don't even come close to looking like a three-year-old. There's nothing three about me," she said. She knew she was talking to herself more than she was to Midna, but she couldn't stop herself. Her fists curled up. "I'm still seventeen."

"Sheesh, I got it. I wasn't trying to hit a nerve," Midna said. "...Your sense of humor still isn't very mature, though, is it?"

"Because laughing at people's misery like you do is so much better than laughing at toilet humor, right?" Vanna said.

"Okay, it's moving on time," Link said, lifting up the door.

Vanna would've liked to have gone against Link's declaration that the conversation was over, but her attention was diverted elsewhere. Just like when she'd gone through the temple by herself, there was a lizard guy hanging out by the door on the opposite end of the bridge, and it started racing over.

"I already killed that thing last time! Why is it back?!" she said.

Once they were on the bridge and the door was closed behind them, Link grabbed his sword and ran forward to meet the lizard guy halfway, and Vanna was reminded of her dream. She tried to tell herself that there was no way anything about it could come true—a dagger couldn't go straight through Link's armor, and he couldn't fall off the bridge with its high railings—but she was still worried about everything going wrong.

Link slashed at it four times, and after the fourth strike sent the lizard guy falling to its back, Link jumped up over it and stabbed his sword down right through its chest. Mere seconds had passed from the time of the first slash to the monster's explosive death.

"...You are way too good at this stuff," Vanna said, walking to him. "But seriously, how did it come back?" She was about to say 'it's not like this is a video game,' but then it hit her that it kind of was, and Link had no idea what respawning in a video game was anyway so that would have meant nothing to him.

"I told you before that evil awakens monsters," he said as they started walking down the rest of the bridge. "There's a strong presence of evil in this temple right now. I know you're gonna say no, but can't you feel it?"

"I feel cold, damp, and freaked out because we're in an underwater temple with lizard monsters, but that's about it."

"I know it was one of the Lizalfos that cut you, but I don't think you should be so scared of them. It was probably only a fluke that it got you. They're just big lizards."

"'Just big lizards,'" she repeated in a mocking tone. "They're lizards as big as humans that walk on two feet, wield daggers, and have axes on their tails. We don't have anything like that in my world."

They got to the double doors at the end of the bridge, and they each opened the door on the side they were standing on. Ooccoo was walking right past the doors with her son flying by her head.

"...Or anything like them," Vanna added.

At Vanna's voice, Ooccoo stopped and turned to her, and Vanna noticed that Ooccoo was holding her phone in her weirdly positioned wings.

"You're back!" Ooccoo said. "I didn't think I'd see you here again. We're still not done searching for what we came to find. This place is so big and hard to navigate! The only thing we've found is this strange mirror that was buzzing a few hours back..."

"That's not a mirror, it's my... Never mind what it is. It's mine," Vanna said.

She reached down to grab it from her. The first thing she noticed was that the screen was cracked—so much for it supposedly being shatterproof—and then she noticed that Ooccoo had somehow managed to unlock her phone and open the camera app. No wonder she'd thought it was a mirror. Upon noticing that the newest picture looked different from anything Vanna had ever taken, she opened up her pictures to find that Ooccoo had accidentally taken dozens of photos of herself. It might have been cute if it wasn't so creepy.

Vanna closed both of the apps and saw that she had twelve missed texts, explaining the buzzing Ooccoo had heard. All of them came up as being sent from a single person in her contacts—Mom.

Hi sweetheart. When I gave Mr. Rider my phone to explain everything to you, he left to talk to you privately, but he told me later that you were very upset. I didn't get to tell you my whole side of the story. I hope you can forgive me for not telling you the truth, but I want you to know that in my heart I was never lying. You're not a robot to me, you're my daughter, and I would never purposefully hurt you. I love you more than you'll ever know. Please talk to me when you can. Be safe, Vanna.

You still haven't answered me. Please let me know you're okay.

How are you doing sweetie? I see you haven't read my past messages. I hope you've just been busy and that something bad hasn't happened to you. I'm worried. Text back when you can.

Or are you ignoring me? I understand you're upset but that's no reason to worry your mother so much. I think I've got twice the grays I used to have since before you left. I love you and I only want to know that you're safe. You don't have to say much. Just reply 'yes' to let me know you're still alive, okay?

I really do believe you're my daughter. Mr. Rider has told me that it's not healthy for me to pretend that you're her, but to me it's not pretending. I believe you have her spirit, that she decided to be reborn in you so that she could be with mommy again. You're my baby girl and I love you.

This morning I went through old photos of you. You were such a sweet, beautiful baby. The first time you called me Mama, I cried. When Mr. Rider brought you back to me and I heard you call me Mom for the first time in 10 years, I went to my room and cried again. I want to hear your voice. Call me when you're able to.

Mr. Rider has told me he's nearly done with the devices to bring you home. Please don't be mad at me anymore when you come back.

I love you.

Please answer me.

Please answer me.

Please answer me.

Please answer me.

"...What language is that?"

Vanna looked over at Link, still feeling stunned from what she'd read. "English. It's, um, really the same language we're speaking. The letters just look kind of different where I come from." She opened up her pouch and dropped her phone in there, then looked to Ooccoo. "Want in?"

"Yes, please!" Ooccoo said before she and her son flew inside.

"...You look upset from whatever you read," Link said.

"I'm... I don't know how I feel right now," Vanna said.

That wasn't entirely true. There were two things she felt, that she knew she was feeling: shock, and pity. Vanna had been assuming that her 'mom,' Daina, deserved the same hatred she felt for Mr. Rider because she was just as complicit in misleading her, but now she knew that wasn't the whole story. Daina wasn't evil—she was a mother whose mismanaged grief over losing her daughter had turned into delusion.

And now, Mr. Rider was keeping her in the dark. Daina really thought that he was going to have Zi bring Vanna home only to drop her off into her arms, when the reality was that Mr. Rider wanted to kill her.

She sighed. "Let's just go."

With foreknowledge of the rotating staircase and pulley system, it took significantly less time for them to get back to where Vanna had left off than it had for her the first time. She had never gotten to put the key she'd acquired to use in the room with the strange oversized insect in its seemingly impenetrable water bubble. Link identified it as a Chu Worm—a name that matched with what he had informed Vanna were actually called Chuchus, which she still preferred the name Grape Jellies for—but he admitted that he had absolutely no idea how to kill it, either, so they hurried to get into the room that had been locked off.

"Wow... The Zoras really enjoy their giant circular rooms, don't they?" Vanna said.

The floor spiraled up around the walls, leaving a gap around the tall platform that stood in the very center of the room. A pulley hung above the platform, which would more than likely need to be pulled, but the gap made it impossible to get to from where they were. Her initial thoughts were that they would either have to get something long enough to form a makeshift bridge over to it, or they'd have to ascend the spiraling floor until they would get up high enough to manage to jump over the barrier onto it, but she got the feeling that the answer to their problem would somehow be more absurd.

Their only hurdle was that the side of the floor they were on was a dead end. They'd have to get over to the spiraling floor by climbing down about fifty feet of vines and climbing up another fifty to get to the other side. Vanna was hit with a pang of regret again for not bringing her TPort—it would have made things so much easier if she could have just told it to teleport her fifteen feet in front of her—but she was relieved that she'd at least be getting NEVA back soon enough.

It took an eternity to get down and then all the way back up, and Vanna lost track of how many times she'd started to lose her grip and almost fell, but they made it. After another eternity of walking up the incline and Link killing the few Tektites on it, the floor stopped going up and instead went straight to the side. There was yet another pulley, and a door on a higher path above the floor that they couldn't reach. Vanna thought that perhaps pulling the pulley would have done something to allow them to get into the door. When Link pulled it, the door raised up the wall, and she realized it wasn't actually a door at all; it was a floodgate. Water surged out of the opening and rushed down the floor. They both looked over the barrier, and the water had already gotten to the bottom and started to fill up the gap below.

"So when it's full we'll have to swim over and get the other pulley," Vanna said. That was a much better and more clever alternative than anything she'd thought of.

"Guess we oughta head on down," Link said.

They started to walk back toward the slope, and just as they got there, Link sat down. Vanna was about to ask him what he was doing, but after he scooted forward the tiniest bit, the gushing water made him start sliding down. She quickly followed his lead and slid down after him. She had never been on any sort of water slide before, but it was hands down the most fun she'd had in weeks. Still not enough to make her not hate the temple, though.

Link was already almost to the pulley by the time Vanna got down to the bottom. Like with the pulley above, a floodgate opened when Link pulled it, allowing water to flow through the channels into the room they had come from.

After they got out, they attempted to follow the channel, but a gate in the ring-shaped room barred them from going straight forward. Their only option was to go through the room that had had the Lizalfos, and out around the other side. Vanna's heart started to beat faster with every step they took toward the door.

"...Oh," she said after Link opened it.

The Lizalfos wasn't there.

"Were you expecting something different in here?" Link asked.

"Yeah... 'Cause I've been in here. This is the room where ... everything happened," she said. "It was different. The Lizalfos was on the gear, and the gear wasn't spinning."

"Maybe it fell off when the gear started spinning," he suggested.

"I guess." Whether it simply hadn't respawned, or if it had respawned and fell off, Vanna was happy that the monster wasn't there.

The fact that the gear was spinning made it more nerve-racking to hop onto it and off of it, but they safely got to the other side where they were able to walk around and continue following the channel. It led back out to the main room, where it simply flowed right off the edge. The water that filled the center of the room looked to be much higher up than it had been before.

"So we filled up the center with more water," Link said. "What now? Go through the other side?"

"I don't think we're done with this side yet, though," Vanna said, pulling out the map. "The lower half of the room with the gear is connected to other rooms that I couldn't get to before when it wasn't spinning. There are these things dangling from the bottom of the gear, and now that it's moving we can ride one around to those doors. We should probably head down and see what's back there first."

It was only as they went around and maneuvered the stairs to get to where they wanted that Vanna noticed there was a locked door on the cylindrical structure that held up the staircase. The chains and lock on it were more ornate than the other ones, leading her to conclude that it, somehow, had to be the door that would lead to the boss. It seemed like such an incredibly small area to house the boss—Morpheel, she remembered—and it made her hope that the boss would be small to go with it. Regardless, they currently had no key, and no way to reach the door anyway because of the water level not being high enough.

The first room they tried to go into only had a key and a gate that they couldn't get to move, so they had to go back and through the second one. Another door past it required the key they'd just gotten, and Vanna couldn't help but groan when Link opened the door. They were going to have to swim completely underwater again through another dark tunnel. While there were a few giant jellyfish in the tunnel leading inside, and a giant clam that looked very intent on eating them toward the end, they thankfully made it through the tunnel unharmed.

After they pushed a manhole cover open enough for them to get out of the tunnel, they stood in a large room that they had somewhat been able to see through the gates. It was circular, as Vanna had come to expect, though right away it was clear that the room was unlike the rest. The walls were covered in a nasty green film, the shallow water was dirty, and it just smelled. Toward the middle of the room were two tadpoles the size of small dogs, with glowing red eyes and eerily human-looking thick purple lips. They started racing toward Link and Vanna, but it only took two little jabs from Link's sword for them to explode away.

"Starting to regret saying we should've come back here..." Vanna said.

Something round dropped down suddenly. Upon impact with the ground, it burst open to reveal another one of the tadpoles, and three more followed it. As Vanna looked up, her regret skyrocketed. Hanging on the ceiling was an enormous frog-like creature with dozens of eggs embedded into its back.

As if it knew that it had been seen, it grumbled loudly and let itself fall from the ceiling. The floor shook as it landed, and they were splashed with the nasty water. Vanna heard Link spit and groan, and judging by the expression on his face when she looked over at him, she could only guess that some of it had landed in his mouth. The frog let out another gurgling roar from its puffy lips, and it wiggled its disgustingly gelatinous body, sending all of its babies flying out of its back.

Vanna pulled out her sword to help Link take down the little ones, though she didn't like doing so. She felt guilty killing them, not only because they couldn't even hurt her and Link, but because their mother was right there, flopping around the room. With each tadpole Vanna killed, she could only imagine Mr. Rider killing her right in front of Daina. She felt like she was the monster, not any of them.

Countless stabs later, Link and Vanna had killed every last one of the tadpoles. The giant frog wailed and jumped up in the air higher than seemed possible, and Vanna realized that it was going to try to land on them and squish them. Watching as it started to come down and its shadow got bigger, they ran out of the way. It seemed to knock itself out when it flopped down, and Link took advantage of that by slashing at it, but Vanna only stood to the side and watched.

Feeling bad about it made her feel stupid, but she couldn't help it. All the other monsters they'd come across tried to kill them from the get-go, and the frog only wanted to kill them after they had already killed its babies. It was hard for her to see it as the monster it was when its actions were reasonable. What mother wouldn't try to kill the people that killed her babies? Maybe it was the fact that she'd barely gotten any sleep, or maybe it was maternal instincts...

'But I can't even have my own babies.'

She couldn't believe it was while watching Link stab a gigantic frog that she realized that for the first time.

The frog screeching and thrashing around drew Vanna out of her thoughts. It jerked backward a final time before spitting something out and falling to the ground as a blackening heap. As it exploded, the slime that covered the object it had spit out dissipated into the murky water.

"A clawshot!" Link said excitedly. "I've read about these. It can grab onto things and pull you to places."

He grabbed it and put his left arm into it. The claw on the opposite end of it shot out, staying attached by a metal chain. After going as far as it presumably could, the claw and chain fell down to the ground, and then they were retracted back into the device.

"...Do monsters normally have babies?" Vanna asked.

Link turned and gave her a confused look at her sudden question. "Well, yeah, how else would they get here?"

She shrugged. "You made it seem like monsters just 'awakened' and showed up out of nowhere."

"They have to be born in the first place to be called back to the earth, 'cause you can't be awakened if you never existed. We just haven't come across any other younger monsters yet," he said. There was a long pause of neither of them knowing what to say. "...Do you feel guilty about killing the little ones?"

She shrugged again, and Link sighed.

"Vanna, they're monsters. If we hadn't killed them, then they would've grown up to be just like the one that had them. Imagine dozens of those things, fully grown, infesting this temple. They would've destroyed it. Killing them was necessary."

"I know, but..." Vanna trailed off, running her hands through her hair. She huffed. "I know I'm being ridiculous. I just have a lot of stuff on my mind right now that really isn't helping..."

"Need to talk about it?"

She pursed her lips. Link's offer was more than appreciated—his compassion made her feel all mawkish, and then even more stupid because the little crush she had on him wouldn't just go away already—but talking to him about everything would mean that she'd have to explain so much. She had yet to tell him basically anything about her family, and he wasn't aware of the extent to which she wasn't a perfect human replica...

"Once we're done in here."

Chapter Text

The clawshot was more of an ingenious device than Vanna had thought it would be from the brief description Link had given her of it. It was only when he showed her how it was properly used that she realized it was probably the closest thing Hyrule had to a teleporter that wasn't Ooccoo or Midna. So long as there was something it could grasp onto within a surprisingly long distance, it could get you there in seconds.

However, utilizing it wasn't nearly as mundane an experience as using teleporters was. Since they had only one, the only way for them to travel together was for Vanna to cling to Link for dear life while he used it. It was terrifying to go flying from place to place, but it was incredibly fun at the same time. It was just the right kind of stupid and minimally risky thing she'd always yearned to do but never would have been allowed to do back home.

At least, that was how she felt about it until they got to a room in the temple where the only way to get to the other side was for Link to clawshot onto targets on sideways gears that were hanging over a seemingly bottomless pit. There were pillars that he could lower them to beneath the targets, so if they fell once they made it to the targets she knew they'd be fine, but falling while zipping over would mean falling into the abyss and more than likely dying. Using the clawshot no longer seemed slightly dangerous and fun—the room looked dangerous and dangerous alone.

"I don't feel good about this..." Vanna said, frowning.

"It's all right. We're not gonna fall."

If it was only one of them going over it, perhaps Vanna would have agreed with him, but the fact that they had to hold on to each other changed everything. Link never seemed to have trouble picking her up, and she remembered Mr. Rider once telling her about how he built his Synthumans to be as light as possible for ease of transportation, yet she still worried that her extra weight would be a burden on Link over the long gap.

"But... Isn't it harder on you to have to hold on to me?" she said.

"Barely. You don't weigh nothin' to me. I wrangle 500-pound goats, remember?" Link said, smiling and flexing an arm.

Vanna sighed and rolled her eyes, but she wasn't able to hold back a little smile at his display. "I know you're strong, but I'm still..."

"Scared of heights?"

"I'm not scared of heights. I'm scared of falling into an abyss."

"If you wanna stay back, you can," Link said. "It doesn't look like I'll have to go very far on the map to get the water flowing from this side. It'll only take a few minutes. I can go alone."

The image of his dead body in her dream flashed through her mind again.

She couldn't let him go alone. There was no way of knowing what monsters were hiding back there. Proficient fighter or not, he would be safer if he had backup. She could never live with herself if he had to die in real life all because fear held her back.

"No," she said. "I'm going."

He wrapped his free arm around her tightly and she clung to him while he used the clawshot to get them over part of the abyss and then down to one of the pillars. From there, he tried to clawshot to another target on another gear, but even on the very edge of the pillar with his arm all the way extended, they were too far away to reach it.

"...Great. So, what now? We're just stuck down here forever?" she said.

She knew that wasn't the case, but it seemed like it had to be. As far as she could see, there were no other targets within a reachable distance to get them off the pillar. Link appeared to be thinking the same thing, looking around the room for another one. Suddenly, his face lit up. Vanna looked in the direction he was looking, but she saw nothing except for taller pillars with vines on them, and a ledge up by them that they couldn't reach.

"Here, hold this," he said, holding out the clawshot toward her. She grabbed it, and he started taking off his baldric.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Gettin' my sword and shield off my back."

"...Any particular reason why you might be doing that?"

He stuffed his baldric, sword and shield attached, into a pouch, then stood in front of her and looked back. "Give me the clawshot back and hop on."

"What was wrong with me clinging to your side?"

Link pointed to the vines on the pillars. "We can clawshot over to the vines to get to that door up there instead of the one down here, but I'll have to hold onto the vines with one hand and use the clawshot with another, and I'll need to climb them some, too. I can't do those things holding onto you with one arm."

"You're sure I'm not—?"

"You're fine. Promise. Get on."

Vanna told the whining, wimpy little voice in her head to shut up as she got onto Link's back. With her eyes closed, it actually wasn't too bad. It was a lot easier to pretend that she wasn't hanging onto a guy who was hanging onto vines on a pillar above a bottomless pit when she couldn't see the pit at all.

"...You fall asleep back there?" Link said.

It was only then that it hit Vanna that he'd been standing still for a few seconds. When she opened her eyes, they were already up on the high ledge next to the door. She apologized and let go of him, feeling embarrassed. Link looked like he thought it was funny.

They went straight to the next door, that, according to the map, would lead to a room similar to the one that they'd gotten water flowing into the main room from. Unlike its matching room on the other side of the temple, the gap in the floor was already half-filled with water when they got to it, and sections of the floor that spiraled up the wall had been broken. At first glance, it appeared that the broken floor would completely impede their only way to get up to the floodgate, but the grates that scattered the walls looked like the clawshot could latch onto them and bring them over the gaps.

Vanna was going to ask Link if he would prefer her to actually stay back this time, since it seemed pointless for him to go through the trouble of grabbing her every time he needed to use the clawshot when he probably wouldn't need her help anyway, but before she could, he was already wrapping an arm around her and aiming the clawshot at a grate across the way. By then, she figured that she might as well go up with him since he apparently didn't really mind holding her, and besides that, she'd get another chance to slide down once the floodgate was open. Getting to go flying from place to place with the clawshot and sliding down the floors were the only enjoyable things about the temple, and she wanted to jump at any chance she could get to do something to shake off the stress that was still eating her up.

Upon coming across a Rhinadillo on their way up the incline—the first one Vanna had encountered since her solo foray into the temple—Link realized that he could use the clawshot to snatch its holed armor right off its back, leaving it vulnerable and easy for him to kill.

"Guessin' you don't know what those things are, either," Link said, intending to continue carrying through on the promise he'd made back in the mines to tell her about the monsters they would come across. "They're called—"

"Rhinadillos," Vanna said.

"Rhinadillos?" he repeated. She smiled at his puzzled expression over the name she'd given them. "That's not what they're called here. They're Helmasaurs. Do you have them in your world? Like the Dodongos, or al-gators, whatever you called 'em?"

"Alligators," she sounded out. "And, no, not completely. They look kind of like a cross of animals in my world called rhinos and armadillos, so I started calling them Rhinadillos when I saw them in here last time since I didn't know their real names. Maybe you should've let me borrow the monster encyclopedia you apparently have instead of that kid's book about robots."

"It's actually called The Great Hyrulean Guide to Monsters," Link said before picking her up again and taking them over a gap. "You could've read it while I was in Kakariko and you were staying in my house."

What followed them opening the floodgate at the top of the room was similar to what had happened with the previous one, only the slide back down was unfortunately much shorter and ended with a long drop into the water below because of the broken floor. With the additional water flowing down the channels to the main room, all they had left to do was find the key to let them into the boss room. Looking at the map, it appeared that the only place they hadn't been yet was a floor below them through the door they hadn't previously been able to reach from the gear room.

The flowing water, much like on the other side of the temple, made the hanging gears start spinning. It was clear that they'd be able to use that to their advantage to get over to the door, but they had to get to a lower section of the room to be able to clawshot to the gears in the first place, which meant going all the way back to the main room and into the gear room from the lower floor again. Hanging from the targets on the gears as they spun them toward the door was even more terrifying for Vanna than hanging onto Link while he'd climbed the vines, and it was made even worse by how frustratingly slow the gears spun.

Vanna pulled out the map when they got into the room. The lackluster representation of the temple's layout made it appear as though the room would be a normal winding maze, giving no indication at all that majority of the room was actually flooded. There was no way to navigate through it above water.

"...You know what? I think you'll be fine on your own here," she said. "I'd probably only be putting you in more danger anyway..."

"Why do you think you'd be putting me in more danger?" he asked.

"Link. When you stitched up my leg, you could kind of see inside it, right? You saw that my bones are metal, didn't you?" she said. He nodded. "And you know there's been jellyfish here that generate a lot of electricity..."

A moment passed before he mouthed an 'Oh.' "You're worried I'll get shocked because of you?"

"Yeah. And..." Vanna crossed her arms, rubbing each one with the opposite hand. "I'm pretty sure it wouldn't kill me, but I'd rather not keep on inhaling freezing water if I don't have to. I swear, it keeps getting colder the more time we spend in here."

Link nodded again and pulled his face mask back up over his cheeks and nose that had long since turned pink from the cold. "I'll try to get back fast as I can so we can get out of here."

He jumped into the water and started swimming down. The farther he swam, the less light from the glowing pendant he wore could make it above the water, leaving Vanna in the dark. Before it could get pitch-black, she reached into her pouch and retrieved both her lantern and her phone. Initially, she only wanted to use her phone for more light, but as soon as it was in her hand, she couldn't stop herself from going back to the messages Daina had sent her. She read through them all again, pondering if she should respond while she still had the chance. Multiple times she typed up a response, only to erase it all and stare at the empty box again. There was so much to say, so much that she didn't know how to say, but right then, there was one thing to say that mattered more than anything else.

Mr. Rider is going to kill me. You need to stop him.

Almost as soon as she hit send, Vanna saw that Daina had read it. She waited for a response—a promise that Daina would stop him, a push for further clarification, anything—but she could see that Daina wasn't even typing. The longer she went with no response, the more she regretted saying anything at all. What if Daina was confronting Mr. Rider right at that moment, a universe away where Vanna could do nothing?

She couldn't handle waiting idly for long. Leaving her phone on the ground, she got up and started running in place to try to distract herself and warm herself up. She couldn't stop herself from peeking back over toward her phone every few seconds, and as more time passed, she began to look into the water to see if Link was on his way back yet. Eventually, she started to worry more about Link than Daina. There were a lot of reasons for Daina not to reply quickly, but her dying was more than likely not among them, and death was a frighteningly possible reason that Link was taking so long.

Feeling about as warmed up as she thought she could be with wet clothes and hair, Vanna stopped running and sat down at the edge of the water. After a few more minutes with no sign of Link, she told herself that she would wait for one more before going after him, and she started to count down the seconds.

Eleven seconds before she would have jumped in, she saw a blue glow appear deep in the water, and her fears started to wash away as it got closer and brighter. However, when Link's arms came into view as he scrambled to get out of the water, Vanna saw that she had been right to worry. The exposed parts of his arms around his elbows were littered with dozens of wounds in crescent formations, and blood was seeping out of each puncture.

"What happened?!" she asked, even though it was obvious.

He pulled his facemask down under his chin and breathed deeply. "Went the wrong way. Backward. The room with the key..." He reached into his pouch and pulled out a large key that looked more like a mace than anything. "...There were Skullfish in there... And I went in the way I was supposed to leave it first, and couldn't reach it, so I had to go all the way back, and in the room from a different way, and then leave the way I came the first time again. The Skullfish attacked me both times I was in the room with them."

"You—I'm almost positive you need stitches, and I don't think I can stitch. We need to get out of here now and find someone—"

"It's okay," he said, reaching back into his pouch again. "I managed to get most of the Skullfish off me before they could bite too deep."

"No, it's not! Look at how many cuts you have and how much they're bleeding!"

"It's okay." He brought his arm back around, and he was holding a bottle filled with blue liquid. "I got a potion while I was in Castle Town. One of the strongest kinds out there."

Link pulled the cork out and drank half of the bottle in one go. Vanna pursed her lips, waiting for him to say something. With all the blood covering his arms, she couldn't tell where all the cuts were anymore, so she had no way of knowing whether the potion was actually doing anything or not. Her instincts told her no, that it was impossible for some blue drink to heal him, even though she had witnessed something as simple as water healing scratches on Beth's arm. Despite all she'd seen, the line on what she was willing to believe in sat firmly before a drink with the ability to heal dozens of cuts.

He leaned over and dipped his arms into the water, which became clouded with his blood right away; when he pulled his arms back out, there were only red lines where there had been open wounds. She grabbed one of his arms, gently twisting it to see that every last wound had closed.

The line was pushed back a little bit further.

"How does anyone in this world die with medicine like that?!" she said.

"Potions can't heal everything, even the stronger ones. They're good for cuts that don't go too deep, but they can't always cure illnesses or heal severe injuries." Link put the bottle away, grabbed the key, and stood up. "Ready to go?"

She considered asking him if he was certain that he'd be able to fight the boss so soon after getting injured, but she felt that he would insist he was fine even if he wasn't. With a sigh, she gathered her things, and they left the room together.

Sooner than she would have liked, they were standing before the final room under the staircase, and Link was unlocking the door. She held her breath as he pushed up the door, expecting to see the boss right there in the small room, but there was nothing in the room at all except for lit sconces on the wall and a hole in the ground. Vanna cautiously walked in ahead of Link and looked down into the hole. Past a certain point, it became so dark that it was impossible to see how much farther down it went. She remembered how the map had large, circular 'basement' floors, floors that they definitely hadn't been to yet, and she found herself wishing that the boss had merely been trapped in the small room.

Vanna saw Link moving out of the corner of her eye, and when she fully looked over at him, she saw that he was taking off the necklace. Once he had it off, he held it over the hole and then dropped it in. After about five long seconds of falling, a plop echoed up the hole, and its descent slowed.

"...Ladies first?" Link said.

"Thanks for being such a gentleman, but hell no. We're going at the same time. On three?"

Link nodded and started counting. Vanna had half a mind to not jump on three, and it seemed that Link figured as much, because at the last second he grabbed her hand and pulled her down with him.

Landing in the water was like being slapped over every inch of your body all at once. The water was impossibly cold, like it should have been ice, and Vanna was shivering immediately. She was mindblown at how little the temperature looked to affect Link. Though she knew without a doubt that his face still had to be red under his mask, he dove right on down to grab the necklace, not even gasping or letting out a swear when he landed like she did. She could hardly stand the much less cold water above when she had the wetsuit, but it was clearly working wonders for him.

When she looked down into the water, Link was struggling to get the necklace back over his head because of his helmet and long hat, and he ended up wrapping it around his baldric instead. He motioned for her to follow him with his hand before starting to swim down. Knowing how much easier they made things, she put on the iron boots, and she grabbed onto Link to drag him down with her.

As they got closer to the bottom of the chamber, something came into view. A large, translucent tentacle was protruding out of the sand and swaying around. The sight of it was reassuring to Vanna in a way she wasn't expecting. If that thing was Morpheel, then she was reasonably confident that she and Link could defeat it easily. It was just some floppy tentacle, after all.

Some fifteen feet away from the tentacle, she landed on the sand, and it seemed to respond to her presence. It started to sway erratically, and a giant eyeball floated up inside the tentacle and then went back down to disappear under the sand. And then another tentacle came out. And another. And another. And then four more, and then the mouth of the monster erupted out of the sand, opening and exposing its multiple sets of sharp teeth.

She really, really needed to stop getting her hopes up.

"Gffmhuhbooengebeh!"

Vanna turned her head to Link, eyebrows drawn together. He repeated the same garbled, muffled mess he'd just said again with more force, but she still couldn't understand him. The third time he repeated it, much slower and with more emphasis on each word, she figured out what he was saying—'give me the boots and get back.' As she slipped out of the boots, she felt impressed that the Zoras had been able to understand her so easily before when she'd talked to them while wearing the outfit. Deciding to trust that he would be okay by himself, Vanna left the boots on the ground for him and swam closer to a giant pillar that she could barely make out along the perimeter of the chamber.

From where she was, she couldn't see too much. The chamber was far too large for the glowing pendant to fully light. Most of what she saw in front of her were silhouettes and mere suggestions of what was there, but they were enough for her to make out what was going on.

She could see that she couldn't have been able to help much even if she wanted to. Link had to use the clawshot to seize the eyeball from whichever tentacle it was in, and he had to stab it before the eyeball could escape back into the mouth only to float through the tentacles again. Each time the process repeated, she became less fearful of Morpheel.

It might have had sharp teeth, but besides moving its eyeball around, it didn't really do much—until it finally did, and it did it so fast Vanna couldn't wrap her head around it at first. One of the tentacles swooped down to Link, wrapped around him, and threw him into its mouth. Vanna was left reeling in the darkness, staring at where she knew Morpheel was and expecting to see the glowing pendant bring light back to the chamber as proof that she'd misidentified what had happened.

After a minute that felt like hours, it dawned on her that what she had seen was real. Morpheel had put Link in its mouth and he hadn't come back out. He wasn't coming back out. She had watched Link be eaten alive.

She yelled for Midna, but her voice didn't carry far with all the water in her system. Midna didn't answer her. Vanna attempted to swim back up to the hole they'd fallen in from as fast as she could to get away from Morpheel, with her only guide being the tiny amount of light that was able to make it down to the narrow top of the chamber. When her head surfaced and she had coughed out most of the water, she yelled for Midna again, but all she heard in return was her own voice echoing back to her.

Panicking, Vanna clawed at the walls surrounding her, trying to find some fingerholds. She needed to get out of the water before Morpheel could come up and eat her, too. There was no point in staying and attempting to fight it by herself when she couldn't see it and she didn't have the items she needed to beat it. It was impossible. And, it seemed, it was just as impossible to climb out, because there was absolutely nothing for her to grasp onto.

She struggled pointlessly for another minute after she'd come to the conclusion that there was no way out, until she remembered that she had Ooccoo and Ooccoo Jr. in her pouch. As she reached down to pull her pouch off her belt, her hand brushed against something next to her, and she let out a scream. She went back to clawing at the walls to try to get out, only stopping when she heard something surface and felt a hand on her shoulder.

"Where are you tryna go?"

Vanna turned, and right there was Link. It was too dark to see much detail—he apparently didn't have the pendant on him anymore—but from what she could see, he looked as fine as ever.

All the feelings she'd felt earlier when she'd wrongly assumed Link had died came flooding back to her, only with even more confusion this time. She knew with certainty she hadn't merely dreamt that he had been eaten, unless everything had been a dream. Whatever the case, she knew what she'd seen, and what she'd seen was him being eaten, so how was he right there in front of her?

"You—I thought—you—it ate you!" she said.

"It only put me in its mouth and then spit me back out. I lost the necklace when I was in it, but everything's fine," Link said. "Are you all right?"

"Uh, no, not really, and I have no idea how you think everything's fine. You lost the necklace, so what are we supposed to do now?"

"I'll go back down and finish fighting it."

"But how? It's pitch-black down there!"

Even in the darkness, Vanna could still see the confusion on his face. "What do you mean? It's not that dark."

She looked down beneath them to confirm that she wasn't going crazy. It was definitely pitch-black. "Yes, it is! I can't see anything past here at all!"

"Well, I can, and..." Link looked down, and his eyes widened. "It's coming out of the sand. Stay here!"

With that, he disappeared under the water, leaving her alone again. She squinted her eyes down into the darkness, trying as hard as she could to see something, but she could see nothing at all, not even the vaguest shape of Link's body or of Morpheel. She didn't understand how anyone, much less somebody that couldn't even see clearly far away, would be able to see down there without some sort of night vision goggles. Maybe it was a Hylian thing.

Though she could see nothing of their fight, Vanna knew that something was happening with Morpheel and Link by how the water waved. After several minutes of waves smashing her against the wall, the water level started to go down abruptly, taking her with it. As her feet landed on the sand with most of the water apparently gone, she heard the familiar exploding sound of a defeated monster, and cyan light came from the same area as the sound. The glowing pendant dropped into the sand halfway between where she was and where Link was, and the black shard-like remains of the monster came together to form the final Fused Shadow above it. Vanna noticed it had a similar shape to the headdress, or whatever it was, that Midna always kept on.

Link and Vanna walked toward the Fused Shadow, and she called for Midna on the way to it. Midna slowly rose from her shadow, stretching and rubbing at her eye before gasping.

"There it is!" Midna said. She quickly floated over to it and snatched it up with her hand-hair, and she was smiling when Link and Vanna caught up to her. "Now, don't resent me for all I've put you two through. I need this thing! We have to do something about Zant, and I can prove his power is false using these! I'm sorry for dragging you two all over the place with me..."

Vanna narrowed her eyes. She didn't believe Midna was sorry at all. "So, is your power back now because you have all three?" she asked.

Midna huffed and put her hands on her hips. "I know what you're really asking, but Zant's more important right now than you getting your bracelet back."

"But you told me—!"

"I told you I'd get your bracelet back if you'd help me get my power back," she cut Vanna off. "I never said that the Fused Shadows were my power—just that they'd help. Having all the Fused Shadows isn't all I need."

"So what do you need now?"

"To get rid of Zant, obviously." She flicked her wrist to the ground and a portal appeared. "We should go..."

Link reached down to grab the necklace, and when he stood up, he held it out to Vanna. "You should keep this. Think you need it more than I do."

"Is the ability to see in the dark a Hylian thing?" Vanna asked as she took it from him and clasped it around her neck.

"No, seeing in the dark isn't a Hylian thing. It really wasn't even pitch-black. Maybe you just have worse vision than you think."

She humphed. It had to be a Hylian thing, and he simply didn't know that it was because he had never known what it was like to not be able to see in the dark. "Yeah, sure."

Vanna walked onto the portal, ready to finally get out of that cursed temple once and for all, and Link followed after. Like the previous two times Midna had warped them, the feeling of being split apart and coming back together left Vanna feeling weird when they appeared outside of the temple. She had never been inside of the spacious cavern Midna warped them to, but she could tell by looking at it that it housed one of the Spirit's Springs. Down a cliff just in front of them was sparkling clear water, and the stalactites above them featured the same swirling engraved designs that rocks around the other springs had. There was no exit from the cavern the way they were facing, so they turned around at the same time.

Standing right there in front of them was somebody Vanna had never seen before, and even though she didn't know who he was, the sight of him struck fear into her. Before she was able to take in much of his appearance besides the fact that it terrified her, Link's arm shot out in front of her and pushed her back away from the man.

The gesture might have been appreciated if she hadn't been standing right on the ledge.

Vanna fell back into the water, and by the time she surfaced, the water was glowing such a bright white that it hurt to look at. She heard the water moving behind her, and with her eyes squinted, she turned to see what it was. It emerged as she looked back, and for just a second, she locked eyes with an enormous, shining snake—and in that second, she knew without being told that it was a Light Spirit.

It rose up high above her, to the point where she could no longer see its face even with her head tilted back all the way, but she still stared at it in awe. Even with how high it stretched, it seemed that most of its body was still in the depths of the spring.

Suddenly, it lurched backward violently, hitting its head against the wall behind it. Its body faded away until all that was left was the glowing sphere it had held in its mouth, and then that plunged down into the spring. The blinding light of the water faded like the Light Spirit did, and the cavern became bathed in a soft yellow. Small black squares appeared and began to drift up through the air, eerily similar to the black squares that drifted up from the portals Midna created.

"Zant!" Vanna heard Midna yell.

Midna screamed, and when Vanna looked up, there was someone small floating above the spring with both of her arms up as if she was hanging from them. It took Vanna a few seconds to realize that it was Midna; she was only seeing her with clarity unlike she ever had before. Midna wasn't some ill-defined shadowy shape any longer. She had ginger hair slightly lighter than Vanna's with ends that faded into blue, and her body was a mix of black and a nearly-white blue with glowing cyan markings over her limbs and ears. Seeing her as a shadow, Vanna had never thought too much about how odd Midna looked—being a literal shadow was odd enough to make everything else not as odd in comparison—but now it struck her how freakishly off she was proportionately.

Looking up at Midna and thinking of how weird it was to see her not as a shadow, Vanna remembered something Midna had said to her after they'd gotten out of the Forest Temple. She had explained that when she was in the twilight, she became her not-shadow self, and that Link was granted protection from the twilight because he was the Chosen Hero, but most importantly, she'd said that Vanna would turn into a spirit in the twilight and not be able to see either of them. They had to be in the twilight—so why could Vanna see her just fine?

The three Fused Shadows they had collected and the headdress Midna wore, which Vanna could clearly identify as another piece now, shot away from her, and Midna screamed again and struggled to move. A voice Vanna hadn't heard before began to speak, and it took her a moment of hearing him for it to kick in that he wasn't speaking English, or any language Vanna had ever heard before at all. Midna yelled something back in the strange, disjointed language.

With how caught up they became in their conflict, Vanna realized that it was a perfect time for her to get away, and she swam out of the water as quickly as she could. She looked up at the ledge she and Link had been standing on before, and she could see Zant standing there, but Link seemed to be gone. She slowly and stealthily walked up along the incline around the cavern, hoping that she could find Link and sneak out with him without being caught by Zant.

When she got up the incline, she saw that there was something laying where Link had been standing, but it wasn't him. It was a wolf with an unusual coat of green and gray and white, earrings, and a manacle around one of his ankles. Link was nowhere to be seen in the cavern. She couldn't see if he was past the dark tunnel that likely led outside, but figuring that he had to be, she slowly backed her way toward it, keeping an eye on Zant.

Before Vanna could manage to get out of the cavern, Midna was sent flying forward and landed on the ground beneath her, and Zant turned to face them. He yelled at Midna more, seemingly not caring that Vanna was standing there, and a glowing red sphere materialized in front of him.

The wolf got to his feet and jumped at it, but the sphere exploded and made him fly back toward her like Midna had. He fell to the ground and his bright blue eyes fluttered shut. Something black and orange was sticking out of the center of his head, and the object sunk into him until it was completely inside him. Midna looked over him with worry, and Vanna didn't understand why Midna cared about the wolf until she finally noticed something. There was a dark gray patch on the back of his left paw, a triangle made up of three smaller triangles, just like the birthmark Link had on the back of his left hand.

It all came to her at once. The shape on his paw that was identical to Link's birthmark, the blue earrings he wore that were identical to the ones Link wore, his eyes that were the same shade of blue as Link's, the green hue of the fur on the wolf's back—the wolf was Link.

"Vanna, don't try anything," Midna whispered.

Midna was jerked back toward Zant, and Vanna stayed where she was. Zant whispered to Midna for a minute, but she was able to break away from him and come back to Vanna and Link. She was only with them for a moment before Zant yelled at her again, and she was lifted and sent back over above the spring while screaming. Zant turned to the spring and lifted an arm, and with his motion the twilight was dispelled and the Light Spirit emerged once more.

All Vanna could see went white, and all she could hear was Midna screaming.

Chapter Text

When the light faded, Vanna was out in a field in the heavy rain with Link and Midna, a ways behind a bridge that led to what she assumed was Castle Town. Despite them not appearing to be in the twilight anymore, Link was still a wolf, and Midna was still not a shadow, though she didn't look quite the same as she had in the twilight. Her colors were practically inverted, with the previously light blue parts of her now being dark blue and the previously black parts of her now being white, and her orange hair had turned white as well. She was laying sprawled out on the ground, eyes half-closed, panting with every breath.

As Link came to, he looked down at his paws with shock evident on his face in spite of its non-human shape. He looked up into Vanna's eyes, and she was filled with almost the same sort of awestruck feeling she had when she'd locked eyes with the Light Spirit. It was crazy to believe that the wolf was Link, yet entirely impossible to deny while looking into those blue eyes. They were undoubtedly his, wolf or not.

"Link..." Saying his name, for some reason or another, made it feel all the more real to her, and it felt even more real when he let out a whine and nodded.

Midna whispered something, but Vanna couldn't make out what she said over the sound of the rain, so she got down and put her ear close to her mouth. "Hurry... To the ... castle... To Zelda..."

"She says we need to take her to Zelda," Vanna said, sitting up and looking at Link.

He nodded again and started toward the bridge, looking back at Vanna as he did. She carefully picked Midna up—though her size made it clear, Vanna was shocked at how little Midna weighed regardless, and that only helped make her seem frailer—and ran behind Link. They were bursting through the doors to the town in no time.

Luckily, nobody seemed to want to be outside with the weather and what time of night it was, so there was no one out to be frightened of a wolf in their town or to be curious about a girl running behind it while holding a strange imp creature. Vanna was following Link faithfully through the streets until she realized he was taking them in the opposite direction of the castle.

"The castle is that way!" she yelled after him. "Where are you going?!"

He barked several times and kept running the same way. She wondered if he didn't realize that she couldn't understand him. She continued to follow him regardless, since he was apparently confident in where he was going. They went down street after winding street until they came to a slim alleyway to what looked to be a dead end at first. After going down a small flight of stairs and turning, Vanna saw a door with a sign next to it. It took her a second to decode the sign as Telma's Bar. Link stopped outside the door and sat down, motioning with his head for her to go inside.

She was about to ask Link why he took her to the bar instead of to the castle, but then she remembered how Telma had told them back in Kakariko that there was a passageway to the castle from inside the bar.

"But, how am I supposed to find Zelda when I've never stepped foot inside the castle in my life? You need to come with me," Vanna said. Link whined at her, and she groaned. "I don't speak dog!"

He stood up and used his nose to nudge her toward the door.

"Vanna..." Midna whispered. "Just ... go, without him... I'll ... help you find Zelda..."

Vanna frowned and looked down at Link. He nodded again. With a sigh, she positioned Midna so she could safely hold her with one arm, and she opened the door.

The few people inside the bar were either sitting or standing around one table in the back—and one of them, one who wasn't even facing Vanna, made her freeze. He stuck out like a sore thumb, standing at least a full head over everyone else, wearing clothes like no one else wore, dark hair uniquely spiked. She couldn't see his face, but she didn't need to.

For just a second, she was filled with the instinctual urge to run to him and hug him and tell him about everything like she would have done prior to what all had happened.

And then it hit her that things weren't like they used to be anymore, and she nearly slammed the door and ran back around the corner, her heart pounding heavily.

Four more days. She was supposed to have four more days before having to worry about him.

Link rounded the corner, making a noise that sounded like the wolf equivalent of 'Huh?' and looking up at her curiously.

"Zi is in there," Vanna whispered, as if Zi could somehow hear her from where she was. "Link, I can't—we need to find some other way into the castle!"

Link turned his head, and then walked back around the corner. Vanna poked her head out just enough to see what he was doing. A fluffy white cat jumped from a window on the second floor and down some crates that were stacked up against the wall. It meowed at Link repeatedly as it got down to the ground. When it was finished meowing, Link made noises at it. The cat looked over at Vanna, and she brought her head back around.

"I think Link is figuring something out," she whispered to Midna. "We'll get you to Zelda, okay?"

Midna made the slightest movement to nod her head. She looked like she was getting worse by the second; her skin was becoming whiter and she was having trouble keeping her eyes open. Vanna felt racked with guilt for being unable to bring her inside the bar. As much as she still resented Midna for what she'd put her through, Midna's actions had inadvertently saved her life, and Vanna found herself scared at the idea of not being able to save hers.

After making noises at each other for a minute, Link and the cat came over to stand in front of her. The cat jumped up on Link's back and laid down on him for a few seconds before it jumped off, and they both looked up at her expectantly. She stared at them blankly, unsure what they wanted her to make of their display. Link stretched up to tap Midna with his nose.

"You... You want me to lay Midna down on your back?" she said.

Link nodded. Vanna cautiously laid Midna on her stomach on his back, and when she let go, Midna's little hands grabbed fistfuls of his fur like they were her lifeline. With Midna on him, Link and the cat walked back toward the bar, and Vanna trailed behind them. Link jumped up the crates that led to the window, and Vanna was starting to climb up after him when he stopped and shook his head at her.

"You don't want me to go with you?" she asked. He shook his head. "Is that no, as in no, you don't want me to go with you, or no, you do want me to go with you? Uh—just nod if I should follow you and shake your head if I shouldn't."

He shook his head again.

"Okay," she said slowly. "Where should I go while you're gone?"

Link barked toward the cat, and it purred back. The cat walked to the bottom of the stairs and turned to look at Vanna while wagging its tail toward itself.

"Is it asking me to follow it?" she asked Link, and she received another nod in return.

Vanna heard the creak of a door opening, and Link quickly jumped through the window at the sound. She tried to get behind the crates out of fear that it might have been Zi coming out of the bar, but the person who opened the door saw her before she could hide. The moment she saw that it wasn't Zi, she felt relieved, but that relief was quickly taken over by confusion as she realized that she recognized the person's face. It was a face she had never expected to see in Hyrule at all; Bax, one of her few close friends from home.

But as soon as she recognized him, she recognized, too, that almost everything about him was slightly off. His hair was straighter, his face was more chiseled and mature, he was donned in an outfit she knew Bax would never touch even in an alternate world with questionable fashion standards, and to top it off, his ears were elongated and ended in a point. Looking at him felt like looking at badly-made realistic robots—he was so close to being a perfect replica of Bax, but there was just enough wrong with his appearance to put her on edge.

"What are you doing out here in this pouring rain? Why don't you come inside the bar?" he asked her. His voice was even more wrong than his face, with a completely different timbre and an English accent.

"I can't—" Vanna stopped abruptly, not knowing what to say.

"Well, you can't stay out here in the rain, can you? You don't want to catch a cold."

She stood there with her mouth slightly ajar, trying to think of how she could explain to him that there was somebody inside the bar that wanted to kidnap her and hand her off to his dad to kill her without sounding like a complete lunatic.

"You need to come inside, too, Louise!" he said. He walked out and grabbed the cat, giving her a gentle scolding for getting outside, and on the way back he placed a hand on Vanna's shoulder. "Come on, let's hurry and get you inside to dry off."

"There's a guy in there that I'm scared to see," she blurted out.

"Who? The tall fellow? He is quite strange, but I promise you have no reason to be scared. Should he try to hurt anyone in the bar, trust me, Telma will have him pay for it dearly."

Vanna hesitantly nodded, and they started toward the door together. Part of her wanted to turn and run out of the town, but more of her agreed with the man. Zi wouldn't stay in the bar forever. It probably would be safer to be with Zi and several other people than it would be for her to run into him while she was roaming the empty streets of the town. As long as other people were around, they could stop him from trying anything.

As the door shut behind them, Zi looked at them. His eyes lit up and he smiled at her, and she wished for nothing more than to be able to smile back at him. He turned and started walking toward her. When she noticed that he was wearing one NEVA on each of his wrists, she reached back and grabbed the doorknob, ready to book it out of there.

Zi came to a stop, and his smile fell. He took off both NEVAs and threw them on the nearest table, then started again on his way toward her, arms open.

"...You two know each other?" the Bax lookalike said, eyes darting back and forth from Vanna to Zi.

"She's the girl I was talking about," Zi said, coming to a stop in front of them.

"Oh. I... I suppose I'll let you two have your reunion alone, then. I'll go fetch you a towel from the back, if you'll excuse me."

He walked away with his head down, leaving Vanna and Zi alone. She looked up at him nervously, wondering if she should have run when she had the chance instead of relying on strangers to keep her safe.

"Hug," Zi said.

She didn't respond.

He sighed. "Vanna, I don't even have the NEVAs on me right now. I just wanna talk to you. And also get a hug, 'cause I haven't had one in three weeks."

She bit on the inside of her bottom lip, contemplating giving in to temptation. Zi pouted, tucked his head down, and tried to give her puppy dog eyes. He knew what he was doing; he knew she could never resist him when he did that.

She hugged him tightly, and sighed as he returned the gesture. For the first time since she'd left for Lakebed Temple with Link, she was warm, and comfortable, even with that nagging thought at the back of her head warning her to be cautious of letting her guard down too much.

"How long have you been standing out in the rain? You're soaking wet and freezing, Van."

"I'm well aware," she mumbled into his chest.

They stayed in their embrace until she heard footsteps come up to them. Vanna opened her eyes and saw Bax's doppelganger standing next to them awkwardly, a dark red towel in one outstretched hand and an umbrella in the other. She let go of Zi then, leaving his clothes wet where she had been pressed against him, and she grabbed the towel from the man.

"I'm leaving for my home now that you and Louise are in. If you need anything, don't hesitate to ask Telma. She's got more towels, or more of whatever you might need here, since her friends are 'round so often. You'll need money for food or drinks, however." He glanced up at Zi for a second, then looked back at her. "...Don't be afraid to ask for help."

"Before you go—I didn't get your name," she said.

"Shad."

Vanna repeated it back to him, and he gave a wary smile before leaving.

"...He seems to have mispronounced Bax," Zi said. It was nice to know she wasn't alone in seeing the eerie resemblance. "Seriously. That guy looks like an avatar Bax would make based on himself in a shitty RPG."

She couldn't help the small laugh that came out from his apt comparison. Zi smiled at her, but she noticed there was a hint of sadness in it, as if her laughter was a bittersweet thing.

Considering his plans, she supposed it was. If he had his way, it would be the final time he would ever hear her laugh.

His smile fell again when hers did. "We should sit down and talk," he said, the playfulness in his voice gone.

Vanna thought about running away again, but he grabbed her hand and guided her toward the table farthest away from everyone else in the bar. It was the smallest one available, with only two seats on opposite sides. She looked over to Telma as she sat down, and Telma smiled and waved. Vanna gave a short wave back before she wrapped the towel around her shoulders.

Zi turned to see who she waved at, then turned back to her. "You've met her already?"

She nodded, and pondered whether or not she should say what she'd been thinking from the second she first saw him in the bar. She wasn't able to hold herself back for long. "...Why are you here? I should've had until the 24th, at least. Today's the 20th."

"Think it's technically the 21st now," he said. She rolled her eyes. "Dad finished making the NEVAs earlier than he thought he would. I got here on the 19th. Since I did some research on the game, I knew you'd come to the bar sooner or later, so I've been checking in every now and then."

"Wait..." Vanna stopped, thinking through the question that popped up in her head and looking for an answer. When she couldn't find one, she asked Zi, "Why did you come on the 19th?"

"Uh, what? I told you, my dad finished earl—"

"No, I mean—why didn't you time-travel back to September 1st, the first day I got here, instead of waiting around for me to run into you? NEVA does actually time-travel, doesn't it...?"

"Yeah, NEVA does time-travel, but I still couldn't. Remember my dad's ... hypothesis, about Hyrule and our world being connected through time and space? Running parallel to each other? It looks like he was right. I did some more testing with NEVA before coming to find you, and it worked fine taking me to different times and places in our world. But once you try to come here, it's like it locks up and makes you go to the time that matches up with our world. It was September 1st in our world when you left, and it took you to September 1st here, and when I left on September 19th, it took me to September 19th here, too. It won't breach the connection point."

That certainly explained a lot. She still had questions, though, despite her gratefulness for the answers she'd already been given. "Why didn't you travel back to September 1st in our world, and then come here?"

"Because then I would've crossed my own timeline, and there's too much potential for things to go wrong with doing that. The universe might not be able to handle two of me at any one given time."

"I couldn't, either."

He laughed, and it was her turn to give him a bittersweet smile. She'd missed being able to joke around with him.

"...Okay, so, why didn't you just travel back to September 1st after you got here on the 19th?" she asked.

"Still timelines. Potential paradox—you already told me that I didn't show up then." He paused. "Kinda sounds like you wish I would've... You know. Brought you home earlier."

Her jaw clenched. "No. I was just curious why you didn't, since you're apparently so set on doing it."

He pursed his lips and averted his eyes. She looked away too, and she reached up and grabbed the pendant hanging against her chest, savoring the feeling of water swirling inside it. It was still glowing faintly in the dimly-lit bar.

"...That's from the Zora armor, right?" Zi said.

She nodded, but she still didn't make eye contact with him.

"...Where's Link?" he asked.

She shrugged. "How's school been?"

"It's ... all right. Same old."

He sounded bored, like this wasn't what he wanted to be talking about. She couldn't blame him; after all, she didn't want to talk about the things that he wanted to talk about. Then again, what she wanted to talk about didn't involve a plan that would end with someone's murder.

"Has anyone noticed that I've been gone aside from Bax, Maddie, and Nessa?" she asked.

"You're the best friend of the most popular boy in school and you haven't been with me lately. Of course people noticed you've been gone. I've been telling them you're with your grandparents."

"I'm your best friend, but you want to hand me off to your dad for him to kill me," she said under her breath.

He frowned. "I don't want to."

"Then don't," she whispered. "Please, please, don't."

"I have to."

"Why?!" she snapped.

The voices in the back of the bar went silent, and she saw the people there look at her out of her peripheral, but she couldn't bring herself to look at them directly. She shrunk down into her seat.

Zi sighed again, and he spoke to her softly. "Vanna, this is gonna happen no matter what I do. If I don't bring you home, my dad will get someone else to find you—and that person won't be nearly as nice to you as I am. And my dad will be absolutely furious with me. All my life he's promised me that I'll inherit Ridertech when he retires, that I'll inherit all his fortune when he dies, but he threatened to take all of that away from me and kick me out on my ass if I didn't help him find you. And I knew that he wouldn't have let me see you one last time if I hadn't helped him... So I figured I may as well get to spend a little while longer with you and not have my life plans ruined."

"What about my life plans?" she said, squeezing the pendant so hard she wouldn't have been surprised if she broke it.

"What plans? The plans that were doomed from the start?"

She was going to yell at him again, but she stopped herself.

He was right. Her plans had been doomed from the start. She'd never truly had a chance at anything. The truth didn't just destroy everything she knew about who she was—it destroyed everything she wanted long before she even knew that it had.

Vanna crossed her arms and looked away from him, tears clouding her eyes. "You're still not taking me back," she said through her teeth.

"Would you prefer to be tracked down and brought to my dad by someone you don't know?" he asked.

"Wouldn't hurt as much to be betrayed by someone I don't care about," she said quietly. She squeezed her eyes shut after she felt a tear roll down her cheek.

"Vanna..."

She shook her head and turned in her seat so that she was facing the wall, and she buried her head in her hands. She expected it, but she couldn't believe he really was going to side with his dad over her.

Something rubbed against her legs, and she cracked her eyes open to see that it was the cat. Louise looked up at her before walking over to a door she hadn't paid mind to before. Zi noticed her staring behind him, so he looked back at what it was.

"...That's just a bathroom," he said. "It's gross."

"I'm going," she said, standing up and wiping at her eyes.

Zi didn't say anything about her leaving the table. She didn't need to use the bathroom, but Louise looked like she wanted her to follow her inside, so she did. Vanna realized before she even closed the door behind them why Louise wanted her to go to the bathroom with her.

Shad had prevented her from leading Vanna wherever Link had told her to by bringing them inside, but the bathroom had a small window. Louise wanted to escape.

Vanna didn't know if it was a good idea. Zi would eventually realize that she was no longer in the bathroom, and then he would come after her.

But Link had been the one to give directions to Louise about taking her away from the bar. He wouldn't have told her to take Vanna somewhere she wasn't safe.

With some difficulty due to its high position on the wall, she opened the window, and then Louise jumped through it. Vanna stood on the toilet and put her arms through the opening, and with more difficulty than opening it, she managed to hoist herself up and out the window. She fell gracelessly to the cobblestone street outside and groaned in pain.

Louise was running before Vanna was fully to her feet, and she grabbed the towel that had fallen off her before she ran after her. She took her down street after street as Link had done earlier, and Vanna realized after a few minutes of running that Louise seemed to be taking her back the way that she and Link had come. It turned out that her observation was right; Louise led her outside the same doors they had come in through, and she came to a stop.

"This is where he wanted you to take me?" she asked.

Louise merely blinked up at her.

"...You can speak wolf, but not human?"

She made no sign that she understood what Vanna said, so she took that as a yes.

Vanna sighed and sat down. She supposed it was far enough away from Zi; there were so many roads in Castle Town, and surely this couldn't have been the only way to leave it. If he wanted to search for her, it would probably take him a while to come the way they had gone, and she could also jump into the moat and hide under the bridge if she needed to. A body of water would be the absolute last place Zi would think to look for her.

Louise jumped on her and curled up in her lap, and Vanna laid the towel down over her body. Though it was starting to slow, rain was still coming down, and she didn't think Louise would have liked to get any more wet than she already was.

She had been absentmindedly petting the soft fur on Louise's head for what felt like half an hour when she heard something coming toward her. She panicked and hurried to get to her feet, scaring Louise, before the sound or where it was coming from registered within her. After she stood, she realized that the footsteps were coming from the bridge, not from inside the town, and that they were very clearly not human footsteps. Vanna looked to the bridge, and Link was there, still as a wolf, walking toward her with Midna riding on his back. Midna still hadn't reverted to a shadow, but her color had come back to her. She looked healthy. Vanna had never felt so relieved upon seeing her.

As she walked to meet them halfway, there was another noise—a crackling, deep hum unlike anything she'd ever heard before. She turned to the source of the noise and startled again. The castle was encased in a ginormous, translucent diamond, yellow-tinted with markings of sharp lines and hard angles.

"What is that?" Vanna said. She didn't really need to ask, though; there was only one thing in this world she knew of that made yellow shrouds.

Midna didn't bother answering what it was, but rather who it was: "Zant." Her little hand curled up into a fist, and she snarled at the twilight. "We have to stop him."

"What even happened while you guys were gone?" Vanna asked. "You're okay now, even though you're out in the light...?"

"Princess Zelda ... saved me," Midna said, pronouncing 'saved' like there was a deeper meaning behind it. She sighed. "And she told us what to do to break the curse Zant put on Link. We have to head for the Sacred Grove deep in Faron Woods to find the Master Sword."

Vanna remembered hearing of the Master Sword back in America, so she knew it had to be important here, though she wondered how it could have been helpful now of all times. "Link can't exactly use a sword right now though, can he?"

"No, but the Master Sword can never be touched by evil. It's the only thing that can banish the curse from him."

Link nodded along to what she said, or at least that's what Vanna thought he was doing at first. It wasn't until she looked at his face that she realized his head was bobbing up and down because he was beginning to doze off every few seconds and then waking himself up.

"Link needs to sleep before doing anything. He can barely keep his head up," she said. He blinked his eyes wide open at her words.

"Since he's a wolf, and ... the twilight doesn't affect you, I can actually warp us down to Ordon through a twilight portal, and he can sleep in his house," Midna said.

"The twilight really wasn't affecting me at all?" Vanna asked. "I thought... I thought you were wrong before, that it was possible for me to be a spirit and still see you and Link in the twilight."

"I wasn't wrong. You weren't a spirit back there."

Vanna's brows furrowed. "Why not?" she asked, even though she thought she knew the answer.

"Whatever the reason... It's a good thing, isn't it? You can warp through the twilight. That's easier than you having to walk or ride a horse everywhere."

"I guess," she said, her voice barely above a whisper. 'I guess, if I value convenience over having a spirit.'

She didn't know why the thought upset her so much. It wasn't like she had ever believed in that religious mumbo-jumbo in the first place. If she'd been asked a month ago if she thought she had a spirit, she would have laughed and said no—so why did the confirmation of what she had always believed hurt?

"...Can we go?" Vanna asked. "Zi is probably looking for me in the town. I don't wanna linger around here any longer."

With a snap of Midna's fingers, they were gone.

Chapter Text

The night seemed to drag on and on.

Midna had warped them to Ordona, used her hand-hair to lift Link up to his door because he couldn't climb the ladder as a wolf, and he had fallen asleep on his floor almost as soon as he was inside. Midna had then retreated into his shadow to sleep as well, leaving Vanna the only one awake. She couldn't sleep, not knowing that Zi was out there somewhere.

She tried to busy herself to keep her mind off of everything that had happened, at first by changing out of her damp clothes and putting her hair into a tangled excuse of a braid, and then by finding and going through that monster encyclopedia Link had mentioned. Every now and then, she couldn't stop herself from looking over at Link, all curled up and sleeping peacefully. It was adorable how sometimes his face scrunched up or an ear twitched or he did that silly thing where he moved his legs like he was running just like her dog often did while he was sleeping...

She sighed as she remembered that she would never see her dog again, and went back to reading.

The glow of the Zora's pendant kept Link's house sufficiently lit throughout the night, and she knew morning was finally arriving when the light in the house began to fade from cyan to pink. When the pendant no longer gave any light with the sun supplying all that was needed, Midna appeared out of Link's shadow, sitting next to him and stretching while she yawned.

Her orange hair was tousled and down for once, falling over her shoulders with its blue ends curling up on the floor. Vanna was still struck by how bizarre she looked—her hairline was jagged, her spindly arms were about twice as long as they should have been, her legs were shorter than her forearms, her nose was smaller than the tip of a pinky, her head was nearly twice as wide as an average one was, and her eyes were the size of lemons and had yellow scleras and orange and red irises—but there was something charming about Midna's strangeness that she hadn't seen the night before.

Somehow it already seemed like days had passed since then, though Vanna was sure it hadn't even been twelve hours since they'd left Lakebed Temple. It seemed like so much had happened at once, leaving her with so much to take in; she had seen a Light Spirit, the Fused Shadows were gone so her chance at getting NEVA back was gone, Link had been cursed and turned into a wolf, Zi was in Hyrule and searching for her already, it was all but confirmed that she didn't have a spirit, and Midna was ... different.

"Good morning," Midna said as she saw her sitting at the table. Vanna noticed for the first time that her voice sounded clearer—back when she was a shadow, it always had a slight echo to it.

"Morning," Vanna said. "So... What do we do now?"

Midna sighed and looked at Link. "We have to get the Master Sword before we can do anything. And then... It's onto my contingency plan. We have to try to find something else."

"What else is there? More Fused Shadows?"

"No. There were only those four, and they're gone. I'll explain when Link is human again. It's a long shot, but ... it's all I've got left."

After Link had finally woken up, they went outside. Vanna stopped in front of Link's door ahead of him, shocked. Epona was standing in front of his house. She felt guilty for them leaving her near the cave at Lake Hylia, but she was relieved, and extremely impressed, that Epona had found her way back home.

Link jumped right off his porch and ran up to her, yapping away at her and wagging his fluffy tail. The sight instantly had Vanna in a better mood. She didn't think she had ever seen Link happier than he was while getting to have a conversation with his horse as a wolf. When he realized that Vanna was standing up by the door watching him, he visibly tried to calm himself, but she could still hear the excitement in his voice as he barked out to Epona. Epona nickered at him before walking down the path to the main part of Ordon Village.

"So, do you know where the Sacred Grove is?" Vanna asked him after she climbed down the ladder. He shook his head. "Did Zelda give any instructions on how to get there or did she only say that it was in Faron Woods?"

"All she said was that it was in Faron Woods," Midna answered. "We'll just have to go there and search around until we find it."

Link barked at something behind Vanna. She turned her head, expecting to see a monster, but all she saw was a squirrel. A high-pitched chirp came from the squirrel, and Link made noises back at it. After the squirrel responded with more chirps, Link lurched off down the path to Faron, making Midna almost fall off his back. Vanna ran after him, but he was too fast for her to catch up. When she made it to the bridge, he was disappearing around a bend in the path. She wanted to yell for him to wait up, but she thought that whatever he was running off to had to be something urgent that the squirrel had told him about.

She rounded one final corner into the clearing that housed the Forest Temple, and she picked up her pace when she saw the reason why Link had run off. Up closer to the giant tree were monsters that she had never seen before, not even among the countless entries of the monster encyclopedia. They were wooden creatures that moved like marionettes hanging from invisible strings, and they were attacking a monkey.

For a brief moment, Vanna became aware of how ludicrous all of this was. This guy she'd been spending time with over the past few weeks got turned into an oversized dog, he had a conversation with his horse and a squirrel, and now he was attacking monster marionettes to save a monkey. She wondered if her life would ever go back to making sense.

By the time she made it to them, Link was already lunging at the last marionette and shredding it to pieces with his teeth. Its broken remains fell to the ground piece by piece and exploded away until none of it was left.

The monkey—it was Rose from before—stood from her cowering position and warily checked to ensure all the monsters were gone. Even though he had attacked them to save her, Vanna was surprised that she didn't seem frightened by Link at all after seeing how viciously he attacked the monsters. Rose seemed giddy to see him, almost like how Link had been with Epona. She led them over to the gorge and motioned toward an opening in the cliff face that surrounded the clearing while squeaking something at Link.

"Does she want us to go check out that tunnel?" Midna asked. Link nodded. "All right, let's go!"

"How are we supposed to get down there, though?" Vanna asked.

"The same way Link got up to his house last night. Thanks to me not being stuck as a shadow in this world anymore..."

Midna floated off his back and down to the tunnel. Her hair outstretched into the shape of an arm and reached all the way over to snatch up Link, and she quickly pulled him over to her. Vanna's turn was next. Before she could even yell, she was dropped from Midna's hair-hand and tumbled forward to the ground in the tunnel.

"Could've been a little more gentle," she grumbled as she stood up.

Midna settled down on Link's back again. "Could've, I guess. But Link didn't complain..."

"Yeah, because he's a wolf!"

Midna laughed loudly, the sound echoing down the small tunnel. Link huffed through his nose, making Vanna join Midna in laughter. He couldn't properly show emotion through his wolf face, but the corners of his mouth pulling up a touch was enough to let her guess that he thought it was kind of funny, too.

Link led the way out of the tunnel and into another part of the forest that was more abyss than ground. When Midna floated over to a section of the ground with a devilish smile on her face, Vanna knew she wasn't going to like what was coming.

At the very least, it was over quick, and they were close to another small tunnel in no time. Vanna started to walk to it, but she stopped when she saw Link sit down in front of a stone with a design carved into it and a perfect circle cut right through the middle. Upon noticing that he seemed to be listening intently to something, she began to listen, too, and she realized that there was a faint whistling melody coming from the stone. After a few repetitions of the short melody, Link leaned his head back, closed his eyes, and began to howl along with it.

'...What is he doing?' she mouthed at Midna.

Midna shrugged exaggeratedly in response.

After the song was done, Link stayed in the same position for a good thirty seconds before he looked to come back to his senses. He shook his head and stood up, and then carried on into the tunnel as if he hadn't just done something really weird. Vanna followed him inside, looking forward to him getting the Master Sword and becoming a human again so she could ask him what that was all about.

Stepping out of that tunnel and into the forest felt like stepping into another world. Vanna had been wrong before when she'd thought that the alcove in Kakariko's graveyard or the Spirit's Springs were the most scenic locations to exist. This was. The way the light shone down through the foliage, the misty glow—it seemed like it had been ripped from a painting, a masterpiece too beautiful to exist in real life. She didn't think there could be any place more fitting of being called the Sacred Grove.

While she was taking in the scenery, she noticed another moss-covered stone much like the one Link had howled at on the other side of the tunnel. The wind whistling through the triangle-shaped hole in the middle played a different melody, and the design carved into its surface was a design she'd seen several times since coming to Hyrule. It was the same as Link's birthmark, the mark on the metal shield from his basement, and even the mark on the metal shield at Malo Mart. She had once been fine thinking it could be a coincidence to see it on multiple things, but the appearance of that stone pushed it out of coincidence territory. She decided to ask Link if he knew about the significance of that shape as well when he would become human again.

When Link noticed the stone, he sat in front of it and howled along to its melody. She expected him to freeze in place afterward as he had done with the previous stone, but instead, Link stood up when the song finished. Out of the corner of her eye, Vanna saw a blue light appear at the top of one of the massive trees.

She looked over to see a small creature falling from the tree. His feet landed gently on the ground, despite the height he'd fallen from, and he giggled and waved at them. He looked somewhat similar to the marionettes, but he was smaller and moved like a normal person, and he held a glowing blue lantern in one hand and a weird horn in the other.

He took in a deep breath before raising the horn to his mouth and blowing out one long note, sending leaves flying out from each bell of the instrument. Two marionettes dropped down on each side of him, and they started to slowly float forward with their sights set on Link. The creature giggled before running off and going through another tunnel that faded into view.

Link launched himself toward the marionettes, and landed on one and ripped it to pieces with his teeth. He moved so fast from one to the other that it was hard to keep track of where he was, leaving Vanna surprised when she realized he was already on the final one. He barked back at her when that one was down, then ran toward the tunnel the little creature had gone through. She ran after him, but like before, she was unable to catch up to him.

She emerged through the other side of the tunnel, in another little sectioned off area with multiple tunnels to leave through, and Link was nowhere to be seen. The tunnel nearest to her was the first one she ran to, but after seeing that the forest beyond it was empty and only led to even more tunnels, she turned back around and went through the other one. Link wasn't in that area, either—he had to have already gone through another tunnel, though it could have been any of the ones she'd seen in either place.

Her hand itched toward her arm, longing to use the TPort that wasn't there to get her out. She groaned and plopped down to the ground, grasping at the roots of her hair in frustration. Link would come back to look for her, so staying put was likely a better idea than going through tunnel after tunnel and potentially only leading herself farther away from him.

Eventually, she relaxed against a tree and closed her eyes. The woods seemed like the perfect place to rest—not only was the scenery calming, but Zi probably couldn't get there, so the only potential danger came in the form of the marionettes that cared more about Link than her...

Or so she thought until she felt something rough slap her in the face. She knew it was one of the marionettes before she even opened her eyes, yet she was still startled when she did. Three of them were in front of her, and their faces were far creepier up close. As she rushed to get to her feet and get her sword out, they kept on swinging at her, but it was more to their detriment than hers; while getting slapped wasn't exactly pleasant for her, every hit would break off bits of their hands.

Several splinters and little tears in her clothes later, the marionettes were dead, and she changed her mind about waiting around for Link. The forest couldn't have been that big. She was bound to run into him sooner or later.

She ended up running in circles and sporadically fighting off more marionettes that appeared. Everything blended together, and it became impossible to tell where she had come from and where she had been already. Once, she found herself back where they had first entered the woods, though she could only tell it was the same place by the stone with the triangle-shaped hole. An idea came to her when she saw it: if there was something distinct she could recognize in each part of the forest, it would help her to not get lost.

After a while of pondering how to do that, she decided on carving small numbers into the walls toward the end of each tunnel she left. They were discreet enough so as not to disturb the beauty of the forest, but visible enough for her to see if she had been somewhere already.

Vanna did what she was certain were several runs throughout every single part of the woods after she had numbered each and every tunnel she'd found, and still, there was no Link. Perhaps if she'd gone through each section once and not run into him, she could have easily brushed it off as them just being in different places at the same time, but she became more worried with each pass through the woods where she didn't see him. She was at the end of one of the tunnels, contemplating sitting back down and waiting for him again, when she heard something faint in the distance. It wasn't the sound of wolf paws against the ground like she wanted to hear, but it was something she hoped could lead her to Link; it was the sound of the little wooden creature playing a song on his horn.

She followed the sound and found him sitting up on a high branch of a tree. He didn't notice her. Sitting there swinging his legs and playing his goofy horn, he looked so innocent, yet Vanna couldn't help but wonder if he had done something to Link.

As if just to prove her wrong, she heard soft footsteps approach her from behind, and when she turned, there he was. She sighed in relief.

"There you are," Midna said. "Link's been sniffing around for you."

"Don't run off so fast next time," Vanna said to Link. "I was starting to worry that something bad happened to you..."

"The only bad thing that's happened is that that little guy up there won't stop running and hiding from us," Midna said. "I think he's trying to lead us somewhere, but he's doing it in the most annoying way possible."

Vanna looked up at the little creature. He was still playing his horn, apparently without a care that they were some twenty feet below discussing him.

Black streaked up through the air, and suddenly Midna was behind the creature. With a swift kick of her tiny leg, he fell off the branch. Though he hit the ground hard, he was giggling as he got to his feet. The stone wall built into raised earth behind him disappeared, and he ran through the passageway behind it. Since he didn't call for more marionettes this time, it was easy for them to take off right after him and stay on his tail.

He led them through several passageways, only to come to a stop at a stone structure. He turned around, and with one final giggle, shot up into the sky and out of sight as a wall on the structure disappeared. Even before Link and Vanna went through the newly-present archway, she could see through it that the building was missing its roof. The state of decay it was in became more apparent with each step inside. Entire slabs of walls were gone, the bottom half of a staircase was nothing more than rubble, and the very floor was almost entirely covered in leaves and moss.

Only three things in the dilapidated building were in okay condition; one was a shiny plaque on the ground that featured the three-triangles-in-one motif, and the other two were identical towering statues. The statues, like everything else, had grown moss in places, and they looked rusted in some spots, but at least they were both whole.

While Link went to the plaque and howled the melody from the last stone, Vanna went to the door behind the statues. The door, too, had the triangles engraved in it, though it also featured a stylized bird beneath them like the shield at Malo Mart did. She tried to push the door up into the wall like she suspected was necessary from the lack of a handle, but it didn't budge. It didn't budge from being pushed left or right or down, either.

After Link's howling came to an end, she heard two loud thumps behind her. She turned around and gasped when she saw that the statues had changed positions and appearances. The engraved lines along their bodies were glowing blue, and one of the statues had moved between Vanna and Link while the other had moved behind him. Midna shot up off Link's back and came over to float beside Vanna, to her slight aggravation. Not that Vanna minded Midna being next to her, but it bothered her that Midna was leaving Link to fend for himself as a wolf between two giant living statues who were wielding giant war hammers that looked like they could flatten someone in an instant.

Link, from where Vanna could see him between the statue's legs, though, didn't look to mind Midna leaving him, nor did he look frightened by the statues. That would have placated her were it not for Link's tendency to bite off a bigger piece than he could chew. What did finally quell her worries that the statues were hostile left her confused instead—Link and one of the statues turned to the right while the other one turned left, Link hopped forward, and then the statue closest to her hopped forward. Link then turned and hopped again, and this time both statues followed his lead, though they each went in opposite directions.

"What...?"

"Link heard something we didn't," Midna answered her unfinished question.

"That's obvious," Vanna said. Link turned and hopped again, and again the statues followed his lead, with one going in the opposite direction. "But that doesn't explain why they're doing ... that."

"At least we're getting close to the Master Sword, so he'll be human again soon and he can tell you. It's a shame, though. I'll miss him being a wolf."

"Why? Because he can't backtalk to you?"

"Well, yeah, there's that, but he was a wolf when we met, and I've spent a lot of time with him as a wolf. I'm still not entirely used to his human form."

Vanna looked over at her, more confused by her response than she was by Link and the statues. "What do you mean? He was just cursed into becoming a wolf last night."

"Remember how I told you that the only reason Link doesn't turn into a spirit in the twilight is that he's the Chosen Hero?" Midna said. "Because he's the Hero, he turns into a wolf in the twilight instead. Last night, Zant didn't curse Link into becoming a wolf—he cursed Link into staying a wolf, even in the light."

Vanna looked back to Link then, still hopping around with the statues. It was strange to think that he had turned into the wolf he was now every time he'd left to clear the twilight, though him having previous experience being a wolf accounted for him being good at walking around on four legs and fighting with his teeth.

Link and the statues continued to jump from place to place for several minutes and stopped when the statues were back in the same position they had been in when they'd first entered the ruins. The door rumbled behind Vanna as it opened on its own, and the statues stopped glowing. Midna floated over to Link and situated herself on his back again before he started on his way to the door. Vanna got a slight head start going through the doorway and up the flight of stairs beyond it, and she slowed as she reached the top.

The foggy room at the top of the stairs, if it could still be called a room, had been overtaken by nature more so than the room at the bottom; the 'walls' were more comprised of greenery and broken pillars than actual wall, and there was no ceiling either, allowing beams of light to shine down through the surrounding trees. More important than all of that, however, was the sword in a pedestal toward the back of the room.

As soon as Link got to the top of the stairs and noticed the sword, he ran for it. It started to glow white, becoming more intense the nearer Link got to it. When he was mere inches away, there was a sudden pulse of bright light that sent Midna flying off his back. Light radiated from Link's body, filling the entire room with more and more light until there was nothing but whiteness.

In a flash, the light dissipated. In the place where he had been as a wolf stood a human Link, donned in his signature green. Link reached forward and wrapped both hands around the hilt of the Master Sword, and with a tug, pulled it out of the pedestal. He raised it skyward, and the fog cleared from the room in waves.

"The sword accepted you as its master..." Midna said.

Vanna walked farther into the room as Link took a few experimental swings with the sword. She didn't notice until she was next to her that Midna had something in her hand. It looked like the black and orange object that Zant had embedded into Link's head.

"What is that thing?" Vanna asked.

"It's the embodiment of the evil magic that Zant cast on Link," Midna answered. "It's definitely different from our tribe's shadow magic..."

At his name, Link turned toward them, though his eyes went right back to the sword he still held out in front of him. He was admiring it like it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in his entire life.

"Should we leave you two alone?" Vanna said.

"Huh?" Link looked up at her with an innocent expression, and she couldn't help but laugh a little. Sheepish, he put the sword into the new blue and gold scabbard that had appeared on his back in his transformation. "So... That's the thing Zant put in me?" he asked, reaching a hand out.

"Careful!" Midna said, drawing it to her chest. "You'll transform back into a beast if you touch it!"

Link took a step back. "We should get rid of it."

"Maybe that would be for the better, but on the other hand ... if we kept it, all I'd have to do is put it back in you for you to transform into a wolf again. And if you can go into your wolf form freely, that means I can take you through the twilight portals whenever." Midna's eyes narrowed and she grinned. "Since Zant was kind enough to give this to us, we should be thankful and use it all we can! All you have to do is tell me when you want to transform."

"But how's he supposed to tell you when he wants to transform back into a human?" Vanna said.

"I don't know. Bark three times?" Midna offered.

"Three barks it is," Link said.

Midna folded her hands behind her back. "So, um, now that you're a human again... There's something I need to talk to you both about. Would you mind coming with me to find something called the Mirror of Twilight? It's hidden somewhere in Hyrule, and it's our last potential link to Zant."

Link gave her a small smile and nodded.

She looked over to Vanna. "You too?" When she nodded, Midna grinned. "Thank you guys. I... I don't actually have any clue at all where the Mirror of Twilight is, though, so we'll have to ask around. We might find a clue in the bustle of Castle Town..."

Vanna frowned. "Castle Town isn't very safe for me right now..."

"You'll be safe. There'll be a lot of people in the streets during the day, and I'll be there with you," Link said.

"And I can warp you two away in an instant," Midna added. "Just ... better not to do that in front of a crowd, probably."

"Or maybe we could spend some time in Kakariko Village," Link suggested. "Renado has a lot of books. He might be able to find information about the mirror for us."

"That sounds good. Are you okay with that, Vanna?" Midna asked.

"Kakariko's good," she said.

"Good. So, shall we go?"

"Why don't we stay here for a bit?" Link said. He looked at Vanna. "You wanted to get some stuff off your chest back in Lakebed Temple, but you haven't had a chance to with everything that's happened since."

Right. She'd basically promised him she would tell him about what was bothering her. About Daina's delusions about her being her actual daughter, and how she'd realized that she could never have her own children and that any semblance of a normal future was stolen from her, and since then her whole spiritless ordeal had come up, so she wanted to get that off her chest, too... But there was so much to explain, some of which likely necessitated getting into uncomfortable details.

"I don't need to talk to you if you don't want to listen..." she said. "Actually, I've got a lot of things I'm interested in hearing from you, like about those stones you howled at, and the triangle thing that keeps showing up everywhere, and what was going on with you and those statues jumping around..."

"How 'bout I answer all your questions, then you let everything out?"

She sighed. "Really, you don't need to listen to my problems. It's probably stuff you're not interested in hearing about anyway."

"...Y'know, I ain't sure it'll happen anymore, but before all this stuff started, I was lined up to be the next mayor of Ordon."

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"That's gotta do with me having to know how to listen to people and make them happy so I can be a good leader."

Link sat down and patted the ground in front of him, and looked up at Vanna expectantly with a hint of a smile on his lips.

...How could she have said no to that?

Chapter Text

Their conversation had lasted much longer than either of them had intended it to. Vanna had received all the answers she wanted from Link—he'd howled at those stones to let the Hero's Shade know he was ready to learn a new skill; that triangle symbol was called the Triforce, which she vaguely recognized the name of once he'd said it, and it had a long history that ended with him inheriting a piece; and he could 'see' places with his sixth sense that he could jump to in order to bring those stone guardians back to their original spots. He had finished answering her questions sooner than she'd have liked—then it was her turn, and she, reluctantly, poured her heart out.

She had started with the messages her mom had sent her in Lakebed, where Daina had revealed her delusions about Vanna being her daughter reborn, to which Link had responded that Daina sounded delusional only because she loved her so much. Vanna had corrected him—Daina loved her daughter that had died as a child, not her; she was her own being. When he had realized that she'd gone out of her way to refer to herself as a 'being' instead of a 'person,' the conversation delved into explaining how different she truly was from humankind, which led into how she could never have her own children. It had been much more uncomfortable to talk about than she had anticipated, worsened by the fact that Link didn't really know anything about humanoid robots to begin with.

Each response she had given him prompted another question to answer. Yes, she looked female—yes, she had at least some of 'the parts,' and they were unquestionable enough to fool her—no, she wasn't sure that she had the specific part necessary to actually carry a child—but even if she had a synthetic uterus as the surrogate Incubots did, any child she carried could never be genetically hers, because she was not a biological being and she had no genetic material of her own. It was only when it finally came down to the matter of genetics that Link's questions had taken a personal shift, and the shift left Vanna questioning herself.

"When my parents died, the other adults in Ordon took me in and loved and raised me just the same. If you really wanna raise kids, why let some 'genetic material' stop you?"

She had stumbled over words before coming to the rationalization that it was because she wanted to be able to do all the things that human women could, things she had once assumed she could do, too. It wasn't like she thought adoption didn't count so much as it was that it just wasn't something she had ever considered needing; she had planned to do things the normal way because she had never thought she was any different. That was what it all came down to—she didn't want to be different.

His trite response had left her rolling her eyes. "Ain't nothin' wrong with bein' a li'l different."

"Says you. It's always normal people who say that," she'd said.

"Yeah, says me, the completely normal guy who turns into a wolf," he'd replied.

"...Okay, but still—at least when you're not a wolf, you're a normal human, or Hylian, who can reproduce and grow and age, and you have a spirit..."

Then the discussion on her spirit had begun.

Though she truly appreciated the consolation and sympathy he had offered, the matter of her spirit, or lack thereof, was the one thing Link simply couldn't satisfy her on. He had suggested that maybe she did have a spirit and she was protected from the twilight like him and Zelda, which was ridiculous, or that maybe it was because she came from another world and spirits worked differently there, or finally, that it didn't matter at all whether she had one or not, because it didn't change who she was. She held that it did change who she was, because it set her apart from humanity even further. Eventually, he'd told her that she would come to accept it one day.

The conversation had managed to loop back around to the same points several times, and by the end, Vanna was feeling at least somewhat better about most of them. She still wished her mom could see her as her own 'being,' and she still wished to be a human who could do normal human things, but Link had a way of making any plight not seem as hopeless.

After she'd had enough of discussing her feelings with him for about the rest of eternity, and both thanked him and apologized for nearly talking his ears off, Midna had warped them to Kakariko Village.

They had only intended to spend a few days there, long enough for Renado to see if he could find information about the Mirror of Twilight. Initially, Vanna had been worried about staying in the village too long for fear of Zi, but upon their arrival, Renado told them that he had already passed through on the day she and Link had left for Lakebed Temple. Feeling assured that he wasn't likely to pass through again soon, Vanna became comfortable staying around.

She had fun with the kids, getting to practice shooting targets with her bow and arrows for Malo and Talo's entertainment, and getting roped into playing dolls with Beth when she wasn't trying to comfort the Zora Prince. She'd made a point to spend time with Ilia as well, hoping that seeing more of the kindhearted girl she was would assuage the irrational jealousy that still sometimes flared up when Link talked about her affectionately. Just as Vanna had, Link became comfortable staying around and spending time with the kids and Ilia.

And that was how a few days became three weeks.

Surprisingly, Midna hadn't complained, not even after the end of the first week when Renado had informed them that he'd looked through every book he had and found nothing about the Mirror of Twilight at all. He'd suggested speaking to someone in Castle Town with a more vast collection of books, or searching the library there themselves. Later that night when Link and Vanna were outside by themselves, Midna had come out of Vanna's shadow and expressed disappointment that Renado didn't have any leads, but she hadn't attempted to rush them to Castle Town as Vanna expected. "Wherever the Mirror of Twilight is, it's not going anywhere," she'd said. "As long as Zant's not in Hyrule, everyone should be fine..."

When Link and Vanna had decided it was time to bid Kakariko Village farewell, it was of their own volition, though the decision was spurred by Link receiving a letter from Telma asking him to come to her bar and bring Vanna. Vanna had been nervous to go at first, so much so that she couldn't sleep at all the night before they were to leave, imagining that Zi himself might have requested Telma to ask for her in the letter. She'd forced herself as much as she could to focus on the positives of going to the town.

Ever since Link had told her that the Hero's Shade was waiting outside of Castle Town after he'd howled at the whistling stone for him, she'd been excited at the prospect of getting to see him, and now she finally could. He had been receptive to all the venting she'd done when they weren't training during the few days they'd spent together while she was in Ordon, and being that he was something of a spirit himself, she'd hoped he could give her answers that no living person could.

After Link stopped at Barnes' to buy some bombs, they were off. They went just outside of the village to where nobody could see them, and then Midna turned Link into a wolf and warped them away.

The nearest twilight portal to Castle Town was by the bridge leading to the western entrance, whereas the Hero's Shade was waiting south of the town. Link surmised that it'd be easier to get to him by going through the town instead of around the wide moat surrounding it, so they came to the agreement to go to Telma's first and see the Hero's Shade on their way out.

Vanna's fear of running into Zi rapidly dissipated and became replaced with wonder when they entered the town. It had been dark and rainy when she'd been there before, and pressing matters had prevented her from taking in what little she did get to see. The town felt like a whole different place now—it was bright and sunny and bustling with life.

She had been expecting it to be very medieval, but in actuality, it was mainly the architecture that had a medieval feel to it. The people themselves were quirkier than anyone you would see in a history book. There were a lot of people with unnatural hair colors, and they all clearly cared about fashion, though Vanna couldn't say she found their sense of it to be appealing. Their outfits looked illogical and logical at the same time—like they threw on the first things they grabbed randomly from their closets, but in a way that everything ended up looking made to go together. She could see some similarities from the outfit Luda had given her to the outfits other women wore, and it was clear as ever that Luda hadn't been lying when she'd said it was simple for their standards. Vanna felt under-dressed around them.

Though, feeling a bit under-dressed might not have taken up much space in her mind had she not realized that everyone seemed to be staring at her. She had never been one to feel so self-conscious before, but the way that people would look at her and then whisper to each other made her worried that they knew she didn't belong among them. She peeked down at her leg to make sure her dress was covering the inhuman slash on her thigh. It was, of course—she knew before she even looked—but her uneasiness persisted. Maybe her hair had something to do with it, then. Most women wore their hair up, but hers was down...

"There—that's the swordsman everyone's been talking about," she picked out one woman's particularly loud nasal voice over the noisy chatter of the street.

"The one who rescued the Zora child?" another loud woman responded.

Vanna searched for where the voices came from in the crowd and saw two middle-aged women standing at a nearby vendor. Their eyes, like many others', seemed to be on her, but their words made it obvious they were actually looking at Link as he walked alongside her.

Well, that was a relieving explanation—everyone was looking at him, not her.

Once they got to a smaller, quieter pathway, she asked Link, "Did you hear those ladies talking about you?"

"I heard a lot of people talking about me..."

She had no idea how he'd been able to hear more than those women with so many people speaking at once. "I didn't realize you were such a big deal here."

"Neither did I," he said bashfully.

When Vanna caught sight of a sign by an alley that read Telma's Bar, all her thoughts about the nosy townspeople vanished and her anxiety reared its head again. She tried to reassure herself that she didn't have much reason to believe Zi would still be there after three weeks. Still, she let herself fall behind Link so she wouldn't have to go in first. Link, mindful of her worries, looked around inside after opening the door.

"He's not in here," he said, turning back to her.

She let out the breath she'd been holding in, feeling like a weight was lifted off her, and followed him in.

The lighting in the bar was just as dingy as it had been at night time, though much like the streets, it was more alive. It wasn't packed by any standards, but several of the tables were taken this time around. The one that had been taken before still was, though the people around it weren't all the same. Shad was sitting in the seat where an older man had been sitting before, and a new man was sitting across from him. A woman that Vanna recalled seeing before was there still, too, leaning against the back wall.

Telma noticed them after the door swung shut behind Vanna. She leaned over the bar she stood behind and grinned at them. "My, you two made it here quick!"

"You did say to come right away in your letter," Link said as they walked up to the bar.

"Mercy, but you have good timing. I was just talking about you!" She motioned to the back table with her hand. "Remember those friends I mentioned, the ones trying to help deal with all the troubles in Hyrule? These are the allies I wanted you to meet, honey. There's actually one more of us, but there's been a disturbing turn of events in the desert, so he's gone to check it out. You ought to be sociable and go talk to the folks who are here—they're a jolly bunch! And you, darling," she said, her eyes finally leaving Link and looking to Vanna, "have a friend looking for you."

Vanna tensed up. "He's not here, is he?"

"Not anymore. He was coming here often these past few weeks looking for you. When I went to write a letter asking Link here to visit, he asked me to ask for you to come along, too—but he got impatient. The friend of mine who went to go check out the desert, Auru, left earlier this morning with the woman who asked for his help, and your friend left with them. If only he'd waited a few more hours...!"

So she'd been right in her assumption that Zi had asked Telma to ask for her. She knew it. Telma had no reason to ask for her otherwise.

"If only he'd waited a few more hours, I could be on my way to dying," Vanna finished her sentence harshly. "He's not my friend anymore—he's trying to turn me over to someone who wants to kill me."

Telma's expression was caught between confusion and terror. "The boy you talked to here a few weeks ago? He's been speaking of you so fondly..." Telma shook her head and clicked her tongue. "What a sad world we live in anymore. I won't allow him in my bar ever again, okay? You're always safe here, honey. And if either of you ever need anything, I'll be here to help."

Someone from one of the tables walked up to the bar and asked for another drink then, so Link and Vanna took their leave to the table in the back. Shad gave Vanna a repentant look as they approached.

"I overheard what you told Telma..." he said. "I'm terribly sorry about the other week. I had no idea that boy meant such harm to you. I wouldn't have ushered you inside with him had I known."

"It's all right. You didn't know any better," Vanna said.

"Your name is Vanna, correct?" he asked, and she nodded. He looked at Link with a warm smile. "And you must be Link. I'm Shad. Wonderful to meet you. I've heard all you've been up to from Telma. You're rather formidable!"

"It seems the entire town has heard about me from Telma," Link said, looking embarrassed again.

"The townsfolk have been troubled lately with all the strange things that have been happening, and Telma thought it wise to spread word that there's someone out there braving the dangerous to help people. You've given everyone hope, old boy." Link looked even more flustered at that, his cheeks and ears an endearing shade of pink. "Even Ashei here was moved by the lengths you went to to save that Zora boy, and it takes a lot to impress her," Shad went on, gesturing to the woman leaning against the wall.

Ashei crossed her arms and looked at Link with a piercing gaze that almost made Vanna flinch back. "All the soldiers in Hyrule are cowards... It was unexpected to hear about a warrior with any courage, know what I mean?"

"Your actions truly have given hope," said the helmeted man sitting across from Shad. His voice, with its Southern twang, sounded familiar straight away. Vanna wasn't surprised when he took off his helmet, revealing himself as Rusl—Colin's dad. He looked rougher than she'd remembered.

"Rusl?!" Link said. "What are you doing here? Uli..."

"She's still got a couple weeks left before she's due... I was only coming up here for a short visit." He sighed. "Ever since... You know. I've become troubled by my own inaction. You've inspired me to get back in touch with my friends here and help the cause as much as I can."

While he spoke, Vanna was looking over the large map spread out over the table. She noticed the names of a few places they had been, and names of places Zi had mentioned, like Snowpeak and the Arbiter's Grounds. The latter one, located in the Gerudo Desert to the west, gave her pause. The list of temples and bosses Zi had given her indicated that the Arbiter's Grounds was supposed to be the temple following Lakebed... And now they had finished Lakebed Temple, and Zi had headed to check out the desert.

But, she told herself, he had never said anything about where they would have to go between the temples. They weren't looking for a temple right now—they were looking for the Mirror of Twilight. There was no guarantee that it was in the desert simply because the next temple was.

"So, you guys know a lot about Hyrule," Vanna started. The group collectively nodded. "Link and I need help finding something called the Mirror of Twilight. Do you know anything about it?"

They all looked at each other silently, then back to her. "I've never heard of such a thing," Shad said.

"Me either," Ashei said.

"Neither have I," Rusl said.

"Nonetheless, Auru might have," Shad said. "We each have our specialties, but Auru likely has the broadest knowledge of this land; he used to be a tutor for Princess Zelda. Come to think of it, I do believe I have heard him speak of a noteworthy mirror before... 'A cursed mirror,' he called it. I can't be certain it's the same one you're searching for, however."

"Did he ever say where that cursed mirror was?" Vanna asked.

"It's someplace in the desert, I understand," he said. "As Telma told you, he's actually gone to investigate the desert today, with a woman from the desert herself, at that. Though, he was only going as far as a lookout tower by Lake Hylia—he's a bit old to be crossing the desert these days. Perhaps you should try to catch up with them and ask about the mirror."

Vanna tried her hardest to hold back a grimace as she looked at Link. He didn't seem bothered by the information—in fact, he seemed pleased that they had a lead already—but he probably wasn't thinking about the fact that Zi had left with Auru like she was.

"Sounds like a good enough idea," Link said to her. "Couldn't hurt to go ahead and ask him. We could always come back to the library here later if he can't help us."

"I-I guess..." she said.

"I'll help you search the library if the need arises," Shad said. "I'm afraid to say I've yet to read even half the books there, but I am quite familiar with it."

"We might be seeing you soon, then," Link said.

"Be careful out there, Link," Rusl said. "Please."

"Always am," Link said. He straightened himself out and turned to Vanna. "Ready to go?"

She merely nodded. She wasn't really ready to potentially run into Zi again, but she was about as ready as she ever could be.

After being bumped into and nearly knocked over by rushing townspeople so many times that she lost count, they made it out of the southern exit. The Hero's Shade, in his golden wolf form, was waiting next to a staircase. Vanna realized for the first time that his being a wolf made sense—like great-great-grandfather like great-great-grandson. Being a werewolf of sorts had to run in the family.

They came to a stop in front of him. He stood up and looked at them one after another. In the blink of an eye, he split into two separate wolves. One of them pounced at Vanna, and then her vision went white.

When she could see again, she was back in the mystical, snowy realm of her subconscious, and the golden wolf was sitting some ten feet ahead of her. She hadn't realized how much she missed being there. Even though it had only been a month, she felt a nostalgic longing to go back to those days in Ordon, back before her life had gone entirely off the rails.

With a howl, the golden wolf transformed.

"We meet again," he said.

"Finally," she said. "There's ... something I've been wanting to ask you about."

"You may ask anything. But first, I must ask you: do you wish to train with me today?"

"Depends... I get that you're this master swordsman, but are you also a bowman, by any chance?"

"I am a master of the bow as well."

She grabbed her bow and an arrow. "Then will you help me get better at using one?"

"That bow..." he trailed off, then nodded his head once. "Yes."

Several targets appeared at varying distances away from her as the Hero's Shade came to her side. She went ahead and got into position and nocked the arrow, aiming for the closest target. The Shade, once stopped, was silent for a moment.

"...Who taught you to hold it like that?" he said. He reached out and repositioned her himself, from her legs to her fingers to the angle of her arms. "There. Now, you may start shooting, and ask the question you have for me."

She loosed the arrow, and to her surprise, it was a bullseye. She wanted to be proud of herself, but she knew it was only because he had righted her aim for her.

"So..." Vanna said as she pulled out another arrow, "it's ... not one specific question I have for you. It's ... a lot, I guess."

"Pertaining to what?"

She shot that arrow at a new target and missed. "...I don't have a spirit or soul or whatever, and I wanna know what that means," she said, trying to feign indifference.

"You have no spirit, but you do have a soul."

"Huh?" Her bow arm fell to her side, and she looked up at him. "What does that mean? And how do you know?"

"To have a soul is to be alive. I know you have a soul, for if you were not alive, I could not enter your subconscious as I do. This is what has been plaguing you—worry that you are not truly alive, correct?"

She pursed her lips. "No. I know I'm alive, even if I might not be by some standards. There's no reason why I shouldn't be considered alive when trees and grass are alive, and they can't even talk or move on their own or think. It's just... I'm worried that I can't be a person without a spirit. That not having a spirit puts me on the same level of trees and grass—technically alive, but ... with nothing ... deeper, I guess."

"For someone worried that she has nothing 'deeper,' you do seem to be considering this very deeply."

"I guess I have a tendency to do that," she quietly said. "But... Does that mean you think I count as a person? Because I can consider things deeply?"

"What I think should not matter to you. Look into yourself to find what you believe."

Vanna frowned and huffed. "You won't tell me what not having a spirit says about me?"

"I will simply not tell you my thoughts on whether or not you count as a person, as that is something only you should answer for yourself. I believe it is fair to inform you of what your lack of spirit says about you objectively. However, I ask that you shoot another target first."

She quickly got out and nocked another arrow, wanting his answer as soon as possible. He warned her not to rush, but he didn't get to finish his sentence before she was already letting the arrow go. She missed the target she was aiming for so terribly that she unintentionally almost hit another.

"As your skills improve, it will not take as long to aim with confidence, but a novice such as yourself must take your time to aim properly if you want to hit your target. Try again, slowly."

She did as he said, and she hit another target, but only barely. "There. So, what does not having a spirit mean?"

"The spirit is a divine gift that allows one to exist with neither body nor soul, and thus one without spirit would cease to exist when the soul departs and the body perishes."

She thought about what that meant. "...Is that just a complicated way of saying there's no afterlife for me? No heaven, no hell, no anything?"

"Yes."

She turned her head, not wanting him to see if she started to cry. She tried to reason with herself in the same way she had when she'd first learned that she didn't have a spirit, by telling herself that it didn't matter because she had never believed in that stuff in the first place, but that didn't make it hurt any less. An afterlife was one more thing she could never have. Everyone else would all get to go on to eternal paradise, or perhaps eternal agony, while she would go on to eternal nihility. She would be nothing one day and she would stay nothing forever, and forever, and forever, and forever...

Vanna gulped and attempted to banish the thought from her mind. She still had a soul, so maybe she could live on in some other way. She blinked back tears and got back to shooting arrows to keep her thoughts more occupied. "What about my soul, then, when I die? What does 'the soul departs' mean? That it dies, too...?"

"After the soul leaves the body without life, it may lie dormant forever, or it may go on to inhabit another vessel to bring it life one day."

She nocked another arrow. "Kind of like ... like reincarnation?"

"It is reincarnation."

"Oh..." With his affirmation, her mind went elsewhere, causing her to miss the target she'd been aiming for. "If souls can reincarnate, can spirits go from one body to another?"

"Spirits do not reincarnate in the same way souls do, but we are able to go from one body to another, though only if we are denied from heaven and remain on earth. That is how I am inside you now."

"You took over my body and you're making me hallucinate, and I'm not really here in this realm, is what you're saying?"

"Yes."

"But, if you wanted to..." she said as she successfully shot a target, "...could you just live in my body, without making me hallucinate?"

"I suppose I could possess you if I had the desire to." He paused. "You are thinking about acquiring a spirit of your own," he said. It wasn't a question of if she was, but rather a plain statement that he knew what she was getting at.

She shrugged. "How could I not think about that?"

"I have never heard of such a thing being done; I was merely saying that I believe it could be done, not that it ever would. Lingering spirits wander the world searching for closure to the life they lost, and permanently possessing somebody is unlikely to bring the closure they seek. And you, the possessed, would no longer fully be yourself with a spirit that was never yours living through you. It is not something you should wish for."

There went whatever hope she had for that—not that she had any idea how she could possibly manage to basically steal a spirit for herself anyway.

Vanna shot an arrow at the farthest target and missed it sorely. She hesitated after nocking another.

"...Why would a spirit be denied from heaven?" she asked.

"Regrets."

She looked up at him. It was impossible to see any emotion on his skeletal face, but that one word had enough melancholy in its essence that it wasn't hard to imagine him with a frown.

"I am done with Link," he said suddenly. "There is still much for you to learn. Do not neglect your training between now and the time we meet again. I will return you to consciousness now."

Before she could question him further, everything faded away.

Chapter Text

When Vanna's vision returned, she was slumped over on her knees, and Link was at her side in the same position. The Hero's Shade was no longer in front of them. Instead, Midna was floating above where he had been. Vanna was slower getting to her feet than Link was.

"Now that you're both done with him, are you ready to go?" Midna asked. "There's a twilight portal to Lake Hylia, so we'll be with that Auru guy in no time."

They responded with nods.

As much as Vanna still didn't like the weird feeling she got from Midna's warping, she knew that Link had it much worse by needing to transform. He never said anything, but she could see the way his face contorted in pain during the short seconds before his transformation was complete.

The warp left them in front of the Spirit's Spring cave. Rather than barking three times to signal that he wanted to transform, Link gave Vanna a look and then started off along the bank. She wanted to ask why he was headed the way he was when there was clearly no lookout tower down here, and the incline leading to the field was in the opposite direction. He seemed like he knew what he was doing, though, and she knew he wouldn't be able to answer her anyway.

She realized soon enough why he was headed that way; there was another stone for him to howl at. She hadn't thought they would get to see the Hero's Shade again so soon, but she was thankful that they could. There were still more things she wanted to know, things beyond fighting techniques. He'd answered the questions she had about herself—even if she was let down by those answers, though he wasn't at fault for that—and now she wanted to know about him. It had seemed like he hadn't wanted to explain the regrets that kept him out of heaven, but that little bit of insight into his life only left her more curious about who he was.

After Link finished howling and transformed back into a human, they turned and went the right way out of the lake's basin. Vanna scanned the area for the lookout tower Shad had said Auru would be at on their way up, but she didn't see it at first, nor did she remember ever seeing anything she thought was a lookout tower by the lake either of the times she had ridden there. It turned out that she was envisioning a lookout tower as something different from what it really was; Shad had actually been referring to the towers at the ends of the bridge. A dapple gray horse and a Bullbo were grazing nearby the occupied tower.

Even with the sun shining behind them and how far up they were, it was clear that two people were up on one of the towers. What wasn't clear was who was who. One was much, much taller than the other, which left Vanna wondering if that was Zi and the shorter one was Auru, but then she remembered they had also set out with a woman. She crossed her fingers as they got closer, hoping that Zi had gone somewhere else and wasn't one of the people up there.

Link started climbing the ladder up the tower first. Vanna's heart calmed itself when he got to the top and made no indication that Zi was there. She finished climbing up, and was relieved to see for herself that it really was only Auru and the woman.

She could barely pay any mind to Auru, though. All she could pay attention to was the woman who was at least two feet taller than her. She was extremely muscular yet curvaceous at the same time, which her midriff-baring outfit helped showcase, with pure red hair, rich brown skin, and striking golden eyes. Her large nose and wide-set eyes weren't features that Vanna ever would have thought she could possibly find attractive on anyone, but they somehow made her even more alluring.

"I take it neither of you have ever seen a Gerudo before," the woman said with a hint of amusement in her voice.

Vanna hadn't realized how much she'd been staring, but she was glad to hear at least that apparently Link had been, too.

"Master Link, is it?" Auru said, looking at him. Link nodded. "And you must be Vanna. Your friend Zi has been searching for you. He came along with us in hopes of finding you, but he left for the desert not long after we arrived here."

Great. Hopefully the heat would knock him on his ass. "Yeah, Telma told us he came with you. You're Auru, right?" she said.

"Yes, and this is a new ally of mine, Mahana," he said, motioning toward the woman. She waved at her name. "Link, I have heard all about your courageous deeds from Telma. Now... I imagine you two have heard of the strange events in the desert and come to investigate yourselves, no?"

"We heard you came to check out a disturbing turn of events in the desert, but we didn't hear any details," Link said. "Actually, Shad told us you might have information we need. We came to ask about the Mirror of Twilight."

Auru recoiled at the name being spoken. "Yes, I know of the Mirror of Twilight... Deep in the Gerudo Desert is a prison that once held the worst criminals this land has ever known—the Arbiter's Grounds. The criminals sentenced to death were sent directly to the underworld by that very mirror that was kept in the prison... The cursed mirror and the malice of the doomed inmates remain in the Arbiter's Grounds to this day. I have theorized that the evil currently plaguing Hyrule is related to this wicked place, and I came to learn more when I heard that the Gerudo share my theory..."

"There's so much darkness still contained within the Arbiter's Grounds that the entire prison casts an evil aura strong enough to awaken monsters in droves," Mahana said. "Bulblins have made an encampment around the prison, and they've been raiding Gerudo territories nonstop these past weeks. Every time we fight them off, they come back with more. We're becoming outnumbered. It’s embarrassing to have to ask for help, but I went to Castle Town to see if their soldiers would lend a hand. Turns out they're all pansies."

"All the good Castle Town soldiers were killed in the attack on the castle weeks back," Auru said.

Mahana sighed and crossed her arms. "I hate to admit it, but even the remaining Gerudo soldiers are too fearful of the Arbiter's Grounds to do more than fight the monsters off as they come. I'm convinced that clearing the evil beings that remain inside is the only way to stop it from spawning any more monsters... And it seems that nobody is brave enough to go inside except me."

"We'll go with you," Link said.

She looked back and forth from Vanna to Link, then let out a booming laugh. "You tiny little things? If you're suicidal, there are more comfortable ways to go out, you know."

"Mahana, you heard of Link's feats from Telma," Auru said. "If there is anyone else out there capable of fending off the evils of the prison, it is him."

"Yeah, yeah," Mahana said through the remainder of her laughter. Her narrow eyes landed on Vanna. "And what about you?"

Vanna's mouth opened, but she couldn't find the words to say.

"She's a good archer," Link said.

Her cheeks warmed. She appreciated how supportive he was about her using her bow—he'd cheered along with Talo and Malo over the previous few weeks when she'd practiced shooting targets for them—but the compliment felt undeserved. Especially considering she'd just learned earlier that day that she hadn't even been holding the arrows correctly...

"An archer would be helpful for taking down the Bulblin guards on the watchtowers..." Mahana said. She put her hands on her hips and huffed. "If you two really want to put your lives on the line, then we'll leave tonight. We should be able to make it to the retreat by tomorrow morning or afternoon, then we'll launch our attack on the Bulblin encampment tomorrow night, and then it's Arbiter's Grounds time."

"Why leave tonight?" Link asked. "Why not now?"

"My people were made to handle the desert—yours were not. Your skin would be as red as my hair after ten minutes in the desert sun."

"I've never gotten sunburned," Vanna said. She hadn't meant to state that realization out loud. She'd always put on sunscreen before going to beaches, figuring that she'd get burned otherwise, but now that she knew what she was, she realized that the sunscreen was pointless all along. Because of her complexion, she'd likely have been burned by the sun regardless if she were a human.

Mahana raised an eyebrow and looked her over. "With skin like yours, I'd be inclined to believe you've never stepped foot in the sun at all."

Another realization: she'd never tanned in the slightest. But gingers didn't really do that anyway, so she supposed she had an excuse for that. "Well, the sun's out right now, so..." she said.

"There might only be one sun, but the sun you know and the sun of the desert are different. But, if you two would rather leave now and burn, be my guest."

Vanna looked at Link and he shrugged. "Summers in Ordon get hot. I think I could take it," he said.

"You passed out from the heat in the Goron Mines," she said.

"That was inside a volcano, after I nearly fell in lava, I was so close to it. The desert can't be that bad."

"Who's gonna drag your unconscious body through the desert if you do pass out?"

"We'll be riding on Bullbos," Mahana cut in. "You two will have to fetch wild ones, but even those are obedient so long as you don't anger them. They'll have no problem carrying an unconscious body."

Link gave Vanna a look that asked for her approval.

"Let's go, then."

It wasn't long before she regretted approving.

To call the desert hot was an understatement. She had foolishly hoped that it being autumn would help, but it didn't. The temperature might not have been as hot as the temperature in the mines, but it was close enough.

Link and Vanna had each managed to find their own Bullbos quickly, though she wished they had quicker. Despite her boots being knee-high, sand had somehow managed to get into them during the short amount of time they'd walked through the desert. She had taken them off—along with her socks and overshirt—once she was on the Bullbo, but she could still feel the little grains digging into her legs where they pressed against the Bullbo's bristly sides.

Along with regretting approving, she regretted not changing back into her bodysuit first. Even having her dress hiked up around her thighs and her long sleeves pushed up to her elbows didn't do much.

Link, too, had shed layers of his clothes early on. He'd started with his tunic, gloves, and bracers, then came his chain mail and—surprisingly—his beloved hat, and finally, he'd taken off his undershirt against Mahana's warning. She'd said it would protect his shoulders from being burned and help him not dehydrate from sweat loss, but he'd said it was just too hot.

He might not have been too concerned about dehydrating, but Vanna was concerned for him, so she let him have all of their water supply. He said she should have some too, but she insisted that he needed it more than she did.

As if she hadn't already been displeased enough, Moldorms started to appear. They were ugly little monsters that burrowed in the sand and jumped out to attack. One of them jumped up and bit her right leg, and her frantic attempt to get it off upset her Bullbo and made it rear up and take off running. She was thrown off, and even after she collided with the sand—which wasn't as soft a landing as one might think—the Moldorm was still latched onto her leg.

Link jumped off his Bullbo and ran over to her, all sweaty and red. She had managed to rip the Moldorm off by the time he made it to her, but he stabbed and killed it before it could attack again. Her skin was torn in the three places its fangs had snagged her.

"Are you all right?" he asked, worriedly looking over her leg.

"I'm fine," she panted out. She was still trying to make sense of it all—everything had happened so fast.

Luckily, they had been riding a bit behind Mahana at that point, so she didn't see the Moldorm bite Vanna. She didn't realize anything had happened until Vanna's Bullbo ran past her, and she looked back then. Seeing them on the ground, she turned her Bullbo around and started to race back. Vanna hurried to put her boots back on so she wouldn't notice the cuts. She was in disbelief when Mahana came to a stop next to them and there wasn't a single drop of sweat on her body or any sign that the heat was affecting her whatsoever.

"What happened?" Mahana asked.

"I fell off," Vanna said.

Her lie by omission must have been convincing enough; Mahana didn't ask if there was a reason she had fallen. "Are you hurt?"

"No..."

"Then run up and catch your Bullbo, and try not to fall off again. We'll take a break when we get somewhere safe."

With that, Mahana turned again and set off.

Link waited until she was far enough ahead to not hear him, then said, "I'll have to stitch you up later... Do you think you could walk all the way to your Bullbo, or do you wanna ride mine until we get to it?"

"It really didn't damage my leg that bad—it didn't cut any deeper than my skin. I could walk... But I'd rather ride with you, if you don't mind? It's so much hotter while walking. At least there's a breeze while riding," Vanna said.

He grabbed her hand and helped her to her feet, then helped her get up on his Bullbo. While they weren't as tall as Epona was, she still had trouble getting on them by herself, though she likely would have been able to get on without being lifted up if they had stirrups.

Link got up in front of her and took off. It was much too hot to go wrapping her arms around his midsection like she would while they were on Epona, so she settled on holding his shoulders to keep herself balanced. He winced at the touch, and she muttered an apology—she'd thought he was merely red from the heat, not that he was sunburned already.

He assisted her in getting onto her Bullbo when they got up to it, and then they were off again.

Several hours passed before they took the break Mahana promised. They got up onto a rocky outcropping where Moldorms couldn't reach them, leaving their Bullbos lounging in the sand below. Link and Mahana were both eating food they had packed, but Vanna wasn't eating any of her food. She didn't have the energy to make herself eat. Every breath she took felt as if she were breathing in flames, and it was progressively getting worse. She couldn't tell what it was, but something else had changed during the short climb up the outcropping that left her feeling off.

Link held a canteen out to her. "You should have some water. You look awful."

"That's what every girl wants to h-hear," she mumbled. "I told you already—don't worry about me. You need the water more than I do. You're n-not looking so great yourself..."

"We have a long while yet before we reach our next destination," Mahana said. She pointed a finger. "Do you see the mesa all the way over there? That's where we're going. It looks far away, but appearances are always deceptive in this desert—it's even farther than you think it is."

She hadn't needed to tell Vanna how deceptive the desert was. She'd already noticed that the faraway pillars of the Arbiter's Grounds, wavering in the heat, had yet to appear any closer despite all the time they'd spent riding.

"So you should drink now, because it'll be hours before we reach the oasis in the mesa," Mahana finished.

Vanna sighed and took the canteen from Link, if only to get them off her back. It was somewhat refreshing to have water wash over her tongue, but the water had gotten warm and didn't help cool her down at all. If anything, she felt even warmer after drinking it. She handed it back to Link after a couple swigs.

She decided to start a new conversation before he could say anything about her not drinking enough. "Th-the town out there looks like it's pretty close to the mesa... So why are we going to a gi-giant hill instead?"

"The mesa isn't just any giant hill; the Thieves' Retreat is in there. You simply can't see the entrance from afar. If it were just you and I, we would go to the town instead of the retreat, but your little boyfriend is a male, and males aren't allowed in the town under any circumstances."

Mahana's response made it clear to Vanna what had changed, why she had suddenly started feeling off. She knew that her heartbeat should have picked up the second Mahana referred to Link as her boyfriend—but it didn't. Because her heart wasn't beating at all.

Her hand flew up to her chest and pressed against it. Nothing.

"What's wrong?" Link asked.

She wasn't sure what to say with Mahana sitting there. She didn't want her to know she wasn't human, but there was no way to say 'my heart stopped beating' without making it obvious that she wasn't. "Just—it's just heartburn, that's all," she said.

"Heartburn?" he repeated, giving her a dubious look. He knew better than to buy that. "Is that what's been making you stutter?"

She nodded and lowered her shaky hand, then took in a deep breath. "Y-yeah. It's fine. I'm okay. Nothing's wrong."

He also didn't buy that, but neither did she. Something was definitely wrong. It didn't matter that her heart was fake and didn't pump blood throughout her. It was supposed to be beating, pointless as that beating may have been, and it wasn't.

"...Wait, males aren't allowed in th-the town?" Vanna asked.

"No. They are allowed to be in the retreat, however, though only with the permission of a Gerudo," Mahana said. "In the past when the retreat was our main fortress, it was very rare for us to give a male permission to be there, but we've changed. Many Gerudo now live in the retreat with their Hylian boyfriends or husbands and raise their children there together. When Gerudo Town was created, the custom of disallowing men was preserved there."

"Vanna, I think you need more water," Link said.

"Y-you didn't say anything about the Gerudo when you t-told me about all the different types of people in Hyrule."

He frowned. "They slipped my mind. I never heard about 'em much as a kid, and I actually thought they weren't around anymore, like the robots that used to live in the desert... And speaking of those robots, do you think they might've died out because they didn't try enough to keep themselves from gettin' too hot in the desert?"

For some reason, she got the feeling there was a double meaning somewhere in his words.

"The Ancient Robots were very adept at not succumbing to the heat," Mahana said. "They only died out when the last humans who knew how to upkeep them died. We actually have some of the remains of the robots in the retreat, but nobody has had luck reviving them."

"George could revive them," Vanna said.

One of Mahana's brows perked up. "George?"

"You know, Mr. Rider? His first n-name is George. George Anthony Rider."

Link and Mahana shared a look Vanna couldn't comprehend, then Mahana reached out to touch her forehead. She frowned like Link.

"You are hot," Mahana said.

Vanna smiled. "Thanks, you too."

Link then touched her forehead as Mahana had, but promptly pulled his hand away as if it had burned his fingers. His frown deepened. "No, Vanna, seriously, you are hot hot."

"Thanks, you too. Too."

"Does she normally get like this in the heat?" Mahana asked.

"She was okay when we were in Death Mountain together... But we weren't in there even half the time we've been out here."

"We're closer to the retreat at this point than we are to the field. We should hurry to get her there."

"W-why are you talking about me like I'm not here?" Vanna said.

"You don't seem like you're here very much," Mahana said.

"I'm like, like a foot away from you. Obviously I am h-here."

"I don't mean you're not next to me, I mean you seem like your head isn't in the right place."

"It's on my n-neck. Como siempre."

"...Yeah, she needs to get out of the sun."

Mahana stood up and then bent over with her arms outstretched, so Vanna stretched her arms out to her, expecting a hug. She picked Vanna up and threw her over her shoulder. Vanna heard her say more to Link, but she couldn't decipher it. She was preoccupied with Mahana's poofy purple pants. She might have called them that out loud.

In what seemed like the blink of an eye, she was no longer staring at the back of Mahana's pants. She was on a Bullbo again. She felt someone behind her on it. She couldn't tell if it was Link or Mahana at first, but then she realized the chest against her back was flat, so it had to be Link.

"¿Qué está pasando?" Vanna asked.

"Do you have any idea what she just said?" Mahana asked.

"No idea," Link said. "Hey, Vanna, I don't know if you can understand me right now, but we're going to the retreat to get you cool, okay?"

"Soy cool," she grumbled.

As the Bullbo beneath her took off, everything got really blurry.

And then it got really dark.

Vanna curled up and sighed contentedly. The bed she was laying on was the comfiest she'd been on in a long time, rivaling her own bed. The silky sheets and pillow felt heavenly against her bare arms and side, though she wished the blanket would keep her warmer...

...She had been wearing a long-sleeved dress, so why was the silk touching so much of her skin?

Her eyes shot open to see a stone wall and the off-white sheets she was laying on. Her heart started to race. Where was she?

She sat up and looked down at herself before anything else. She was wearing a bandeau top and maroon harem pants, and her right calf was bandaged. Seeing the bandage made her recall a brief memory; she had been riding a boar in the desert when a monster bit her leg. More details came to her the longer she tried to remember them, though they were vague. The name of the Gerudo woman they had been traveling with was just beyond her grasp, along with whatever had happened between the Moldorm biting her leg and ending up in this bedroom.

Hoping that something in it would jog her memory, she turned to inspect the room. Aside from the bed, the only other furniture in the small room was a nightstand with a lit candle on it and a red couch. Sleeping on that couch was none other than Link, wearing only his pants, with his right arm bandaged. His skin was burned, especially his nose, cheeks, and shoulders.

"Link?" she called.

He didn't stir, but her shadow did. Midna appeared in front of her.

"We thought you'd never wake up!" Midna said.

Her loudness managed to wake Link. He blinked a few times, and his eyes widened when they focused on Vanna. He sat up, accidentally knocking his undershirt he'd been using as a makeshift pillow to the floor.

"You're awake," he yawned out.

Vanna poured out questions as they came to mind. "How long was I out? Where are we and when did we get here? What happened to your arm? What happened to me? And who the hell changed my clothes and why?"

Link stood up and started to walk over to the bed, grabbing and putting on his undershirt on the way. "Mahana changed your clothes to keep you cool," he said as he sat on the bed next to her.

"Mahana," she repeated. That rung a bell. "The Gerudo woman?"

"The one we came here with, yeah. And, uh... I don't know if you remember, but you got bit by a Moldorm and it tore up your leg. And Mahana saw it when she took off your boots, so... I had to tell her you're a robot," Link said, rubbing the nape of his neck. "Well, she kinda figured it out herself, but I confirmed it. I hope you're not mad at me."

Vanna sighed. "I mean... I didn't want anyone else to know, but I can’t be mad at you for telling her if she already had a clue."

"I'd never tell anyone if I didn't have to. I stitched you up before she put the bandage over your leg, by the way." He looked at his arm and pulled a face. "And the same thing happened to my arm as your leg, only with a lot more blood. A Moldorm with a real high jump decided that my arm looked like a nice snack on the way here after you passed out."

"I passed out?"

"That wasn't obvious?"

"...In hindsight, maybe," she quietly admitted. "I just didn't think the heat was a problem for me after the Goron Mines... Maybe it was just the prolonged exposure that was the problem this time. But when did I pass out anyway? After the Moldorm bit me? I can't remember anything after that..."

"It was a few hours after that. We stopped to take a break and you started actin' all weird." He smiled, appearing to be holding back a laugh. "It really was worrying ... but it was sorta funny. Right before you passed out, you kept on saying 'poofy purple pants,' and you said a few things that weren't in Hylian..."

"And you called Link hot," Midna said.

...

Vanna wished the heat would have just killed her.

She covered her face with her hands, plopped back on the bed, and groaned as Link and Midna burst into laughter.

"If it's any consolation," Midna said through her giggles, "you also called Mahana hot."

Vanna groaned again, which only invigorated Midna's laughing.

At least a little bit of good came out of Midna relaying what Vanna had said; it brought up some memories from around the time she'd said those things. She remembered that her heart, which was working fine now, had stopped beating. She also vaguely remembered Mahana saying that they were going to the Thieves' Retreat, that males were barred from entering Gerudo Town, and something about there being defunct robots in the retreat.

"Are we in the Thieves' Retreat now?" Vanna asked.

"Hey, don't try to change the subject!" Midna said.

"Yes," Link answered. "We got here yesterday evening. We're in Mahana's parents' house, in her little sister's old bedroom."

"What time is it?" Vanna asked.

"'Bout dusk, I'd guess? I tried gettin' some sleep early so I wouldn't be tired in case you'd wake up and wanna leave for the Arbiter's Grounds tonight." As if just talking about sleep suddenly made him sleepy again, he yawned. It made Vanna realize that she wanted more sleep, too.

She finally pulled her hands off her face, feeling mostly over her bout of embarrassment, and she propped herself up on her elbows. "We don't have to go tonight, do we? I know I was just out of it for more than a day, but I'm actually still kinda tired..."

"Nah. Mahana still wants to leave at nighttime, but it doesn't have to be tonight. We can go when we're ready."

"Okay. I'm not ready."

"Good, me either." Link lay back and closed his eyes, leaving his legs dangling off the edge. "This bed is really cozy..."

"Want me to take the couch tonight?" she offered.

"I don't mind sharing the bed if you don't mind."

Midna opened her mouth to say something, so Vanna glared at her. She giggled instead.

"If you really don't mind, then..." Vanna trailed off.

"It's fine. I used to share a bed with Ilia all the time when we were young." To Vanna's surprise, hearing that didn't make her too jealous, though it was likely only because he'd specified that they did so when they were young, highlighting the innocence behind it. It was actually kind of sweet.

"I guess I'll be sleeping in the shadows..." Midna said before dramatically sighing.

"You can sleep on the bed too if you want," Link said as he got up. "You're little, there's enough room."

"I do tend to prefer the comfort of a nice, dark shadow to fall asleep in... But now that you mention it, I think I will sleep on the bed." Midna smiled at Vanna. "Scooch over to the wall. I wanna sleep in the middle."

Vanna would have glared at her again if Link wasn't looking. "That's twice the chance for you to accidentally get crushed by one of us rolling over in our sleep."

"I'll take my chances. Scoot."

Vanna humphed and moved over. Midna crawled up with the blanket in hand and lay down on her side next to her, and brought the blanket up to her shoulders, smiling still.

Link pinched out the flame of the candle, sending the room into total darkness. Vanna heard the shifting of fabric and a tiny squeak of the metal bedstead as he settled in for the night.

"Sleep tight," Midna said in a gentle, melodious tone. "Don't let the shadow bugs bite!"

Chapter Text

"They raided the town again! You need to get up and come with me, now!"

Vanna bolted upright, shocked out of her sleep, and saw the backlit silhouette of someone standing in the doorway. In her hazy state, it took a second for things to click into place. The person in the doorway was Mahana, and she was yelling about 'them' raiding the town—them, meaning the Bulblins from the Arbiter's Grounds.

"You're up? You need to come too, and bring your bow! I'll be waiting outside. Hurry!"

Mahana had disappeared from the doorway before she'd finished speaking, and Link had shot up out of the bed as well. Vanna scrambled to follow, getting her feet tangled in the blanket in the process. She made it out of the bedroom a few seconds after Link and found him over by a tall table strapping on his belts while Mahana rushed out of the house. All of her stuff was on the table next to Link's in a disorganized pile.

Midna appeared as the door slammed shut behind Mahana. "There goes our nice night of sleep, huh? Vanna, just get your bow and quiver—I'll put everything you don't need right now in your pouch for you! Same goes for you, Link!"

Vanna ran over to the table, slung her bow and quiver over her shoulder, and hurried to attach her pouch to her belt. Her sword, shield, and discarded clothes went up in little black squares and flickered away, along with Link's outerwear that he was forgoing. He was finishing pulling on his boots as Midna dove back down into Vanna's shadow.

"Why didn't you leave my boots out for me?" Vanna asked.

"Link was already putting his on."

"You can put them on later," he said. "Let's go."

He grabbed her hand and pulled her out of the door Mahana had left through. Mahana stood several feet from the door, arms crossed, tapping a foot impatiently. She wore gauntlets and greaves she hadn't been wearing before and she had a sword at each hip. When she noticed them, she took off running, yelling for them to follow. Link let go of Vanna's hand, and they ran after her.

Vanna tried to take in her surroundings while running, partially so that she would remember how to get back to Mahana's house if she ever needed to, but mainly out of curiosity. Steep walls shot up around the edges of the retreat, and the houses, stacked atop one another like toy blocks, looked to be made out of stone taken directly from the mesa they were nestled inside of. Mahana's house was one of many on a higher level, and the stairs that led down from it had been made from the same stone.

Unfortunately, she hardly got to be impressed by the work that had gone into creating the retreat before they were exiting it through an arch in the surrounding walls.

A Bullbo, which she recognized as Mahana's by its saddle, was waiting outside. Mahana jumped onto it in a nimble movement incongruous with her size, landing as far up on the saddle as possible.

"Get behind me," she said, nearly shouting. "We don't have time to chase down separate mounts for you."

Not even allowing her the chance to attempt to get on by herself, Link lifted Vanna up. As soon as Link was settled behind her, the Bullbo took off. She expected it to run slower than usual, but it didn't seem held back whatsoever by the extra weight it was carrying.

If there was one good thing about being so thoroughly sandwiched between Mahana and Link, aside from the obvious, it was the warmth that came with it. The outfit Mahana had put her in wasn't any help against the cold of the night.

Vanna tilted her head out enough to see past Mahana. The town already looked fairly close to them, though she wasn't sure just how close given what Mahana had previously said about appearances being deceptive in the desert. Regardless, she didn't think it would take too long to get there. While she guessed that fact would bring relief to Mahana, it brought worry to her, because she was reminded that males were prohibited from the town. She couldn't imagine herself fighting a swarm of monsters without Link, not after what had happened the time she had tried to fight off just one Lizalfos on her own.

"Mahana, I know you said that males aren't allowed in the town under any circumstances, but can there be an exception so Link can come in to help fight the Bulblins off?" she asked.

"The Bulblins aren't in the town anymore. They already went back to their encampment."

"Really?" Link said. "Then... Why do we have to go fight them now if they already backed off? We were kinda tryna get some sleep..."

"Because they kidnapped girls from the town and your sleep is not more important than my little sister!"

Her words weren't even directed at Vanna, yet she still cringed back from them. The sound of her yelling should have been enough to scare the Bulblins away from the town forever.

"Sorry," Link muttered. "I didn't know..."

Mahana sighed. "I'm sorry for yelling at you. I'm just so angry. The raid happened hours ago and nobody thought to tell me until now that my sister was kidnapped! And plenty of our soldiers went off after them and got themselves injured, and..." She let out a noise halfway between a groan and a growl. "We're the only ones who can save the girls now. And it's going to start with you, Vanna."

"Me?" she said.

"Their encampment is heavily guarded. There'll be plenty of Bulblins either on watchtowers or patrolling, and if they catch us, they'll call for reinforcements to come attack us. As weak as individual Bulblins are, they have strength in their numbers, and the three of us can't hope to fight off all the reinforcements. You're going to take out the guards with your arrows so we can slip in unnoticed."

Vanna suddenly regretted not saying anything back when Link had told Mahana that she was a good archer. Their mission was riding on competence that she barely had.

It was about ten minutes before they passed up the walled town, and another five or so before they stopped and got down behind a rock for cover. They were closer to the Bulblin territory than Vanna felt comfortable being, within a hundred feet of some of their shoddily constructed watchtowers. She could count eight towers from where they were, though it appeared that only two were occupied, and about ten Bulblins were lounging around a campfire.

As close as they were, though, she was concerned that they weren't close enough for her to shoot down the guards. The bow might have had a great range, but that range would mean nothing if she couldn't get a good aim on the Bulblins. The ones around the campfire were easy to see from the light of the fire, but she could only scarcely make out the ones up on the towers if their glowing red eyes weren't facing them.

"It's so dark... Did they really have to attack at nighttime?" she said, keeping her voice quiet.

"It's a good thing for you that they did. They can detect movement easily in the dark, but that aside, their night vision isn't great. As long as you stay mostly still while shooting, they shouldn't be able to see you from here," Mahana said.

It was good to know that they likely wouldn't be able to see her, but that didn't exactly solve the problem of her not being able to see them. "And you want me to take out all of them?"

"If you can, but it'd be best to start with the guards on the towers. They're the ones that'll call for backup if they notice you."

So the hardest shots were the most necessary. Of course.

She stood up and carefully readied her bow and arrow, positioning herself the way the Hero's Shade had taught her, and focused her aim on the nearest guard. Her heart sped up when it turned to face her. Its eyes seemed to bore into her, and she could have sworn she'd already been caught. She held as still as possible, holding her breath and hoping that it would look away.

Vanna sighed in relief when it finally did turn. She wasn't going to wait for it to look her way again, so she loosed her arrow before it could. To her surprise, she managed to hit it and send it falling off its tower. The Bulblins around the campfire all jumped up as its body hit the ground and exploded away. She crouched back down behind the rock in case any of them would look for what had killed it.

"Got one of the guards," she whispered.

"Good. Now get back up there and kill the other," Mahana said.

Vanna slowly stood up. The Bulblins by the campfire had settled back down and none appeared to be looking her way.

It took her a moment to locate the second guard. Because it was farther away from the campfire than the other one had been, it was harder to see, and both of those things made it harder to shoot. Three arrows later, it was down, and she crouched down as well.

"You only have the ones around the fire left now?" Link asked. She nodded, and he started combing through one of his pouches. "I've got an idea..." His hands came back around with a bomb, and he smiled.

"...You are out of your mind if you think I'm running up there and throwing a bomb at them," she said.

"That wasn't what I was thinking of. Give me an arrow."

She was suspicious, but she handed him an arrow anyway. He put the bomb in his lap upside down and poked the arrow through a slim hole in the bottom. Once the arrowhead was fully inside, he turned the arrow until there was a small click.

"Barnes makes his bombs attachable to arrows," he explained, holding up the finished combined item by the arrow shaft. "Just light the fuse and shoot, and the bomb will explode wherever it lands. It could take out all those Bulblins left over in one go."

"We should've gotten bombs earlier," she said, annoyed that they had been missing out. "But... How am I supposed to light the fuse? I don't have any..." Vanna trailed off as it struck her that she didn't need a match.

"Shooting it into their fire could set it off," Mahana suggested.

"Or, you could light it for me with your magic," Vanna said to Link.

Mahana raised an eyebrow at him. "You're a magician?"

"Not a proficient one, but I can do it," Link said. "The fuse is short, though, so you oughta get your aim all ready to go before I light it so you don't accidentally blow us up."

Vanna nodded and got up. Once she thought her aim was sufficient, she told Link she was ready. He stood up next to her, brought his finger to the fuse, and created a small flame. With the fuse lit, he quickly retracted his arm, and she let the bomb arrow fly. A breeze at the last second altered its trajectory, making it land farther to the left than she wanted. The resulting explosion took out all but two of the rightmost Bulblins.

"Did you get them?" Mahana asked.

"I missed two," Vanna answered.

"Good enough. I can handle those," Mahana said as she stood. "One of you ride my Bullbo up behind me. Looks like we'll be needing him."

Mahana jumped over the rock and started to race toward the Bulblins while Link hopped up on her Bullbo. Vanna jogged next to Link after he had nudged the Bullbo into a slow stride, letting Mahana get ahead. By the time they caught up to her, both of the remaining Bulblins had been dispatched, and she was sheathing her dual scimitars. Vanna was impressed by how easily Mahana had killed them—though not surprised, given how small they were in comparison to her—but it simultaneously unnerved her. If Mahana found it that easy to take down just two of them, yet she didn't think they could handle all the Bulblins in the encampment, just how many were there?

"The camp is past the gates they have up ahead," Mahana said, walking over to the back of her Bullbo that Link was still on. "And the easiest way to get past these gates would be to knock them down, so..."

Mahana drew her hand back and smacked the Bullbo on the ass, and it squealed and reared. Link screamed as the Bullbo took off running at full speed. He was able to stay on the animal somehow, though only just barely, flopping around on its saddle even as it crashed through the wooden gates. Vanna felt guilty for the laugh that escaped her at the sight, but that amusement turned into concern when the Bullbo ran directly into the steep side of a hill with a loud thunk. Link was flung off from the impact and landed a yard away from the Bullbo on rocky ground while it toppled to the sand.

"Link!" Vanna yelled.

She ran to him, leaving behind a heartily laughing Mahana, and fell to her knees next to him. His face was contorted in pain and he was curled up on his side, arms clutching his midsection.

"Did you break something?!" she asked.

"No," he grunted. He slowly rolled over to his back and draped an arm over his face. "But—ugh—I don't think I can have kids anymore..."

It took a second for what he said to kick in, and then she laughed. If he was able to joke like that, he was probably okay. "...Then I guess we're in the same boat. Adoption it is."

He huffed out a laugh, his pained expression softening into a small, bitter grin. "Sorry, that was rude to say around you..."

"It wasn't, really." She decided not to tell him that she actually liked that he hadn't been thinking of her inability to have kids before he spoke, that he forgot about it until she brought it up. Her being different was not something he thought about, and that was exactly how she wanted things to be.

Mahana made it up to them, still chuckling every few seconds. She made an attempt to contain herself further as she asked, "Are you hurt?"

"'M fine," Link said. With a groan, he pushed himself up on his elbows. Vanna didn't notice until then that the right side of his face was scuffed up.

"Sorry for laughing at your pain, but that was the best mood-lightener I've witnessed in years. Why didn't you just let go, you moron?" Mahana said through the remainder of her laughter.

He shrugged, and then groaned again and scrunched his face up.

Vanna frowned. "You are hurt."

"Only a little... I landed on my right shoulder. It kinda hurts to move it," he said, reaching up and rubbing it with his left hand.

"Well, you better have a potion or you better be adept at using your sword left-handed," Mahana said.

He shot a quick glare up at her. "I'm left-handed."

"Your idiocy shouldn't impede our progress, then. Let's go."

For the most part, sneaking through the Bulblin encampment couldn't have gone better.

Being in charge of shooting down any guards meant that Vanna had to take the lead, and though her heart felt like it was going to beat out of her chest the entire time, she got them deep into the encampment without any trouble. There were two times when she was spotted by patrolling Bulblins, but she was able to take them down before they could do anything.

It was only right at the end, right when they were searching for a key so they could get inside the wooden structure that they'd heard the kidnapped girls inside of, that things went wrong.

Knowing they were nearing the end, Mahana became less conscious of her towering height, and she had taken a step forward from beside a tall wall to where the top of the wall was broken off, revealing her head to the final guard Vanna hadn't taken down yet. A horn blared, and countless Bulblins screeched in response. Vanna couldn't see them from where she was, but the sound of their voices and all the sand being kicked up by their feet told her that they were coming, fast.

Vanna yelped as she felt a pair of hands roughly grab her hips from behind and lift her up. "What are you—?!"

"Get on top of the wall!" Mahana yelled. "You'll be safe up there!"

Vanna lifted her legs up and planted her feet on the jagged top of the wall, and nearly toppled over when Mahana let her go. From her vantage point, she could see the horde of Bulblins pouring out of a gate and rushing toward them. There were even more than she'd thought there would be.

Slowly, being exceedingly cautious to not lose her balance, she stood up from the crouch she'd been in. She had to look away when Link and Mahana ran around in front of the wall and clashed with the Bulblins. Link had thought to slip on his chain mail before they'd entered the camp, but Mahana's only armor was on her calves and forearms, leaving her vital organs vulnerable, and she didn't even have a shield. Vanna couldn't bear to watch what had to be coming for her.

Vanna attempted to get herself in shooting position to the best of her ability with what little leg room she had, and she shot at the guard that had called in the reinforcements. Her attention turned to the horde once it was down. Because there were so many Bulblins, it was basically impossible to miss a shot, at least, though she had to be careful to not unintentionally shoot Link or Mahana.

It seemed like they'd hardly put a dent in the Bulblins even when she was nearly out of arrows. With only three more in her quiver to spare, she got an idea that she was mad at herself for not thinking of earlier. She knew her plan would work wonders for them if she could only get it to fruition in the first place.

"Link!" she yelled. She feared the distraction would cause him to let his guard down and get hurt, but this was their only chance. "Throw your pouch to me!"

He glanced up at her between swings, brows furrowed. "I'm kinda busy here!"

"Just get behind your shield and do it! It's important!"

He groaned. "Which one? I have two!"

"Whichever one you put the bombs in!"

He sheathed his sword, holding his shield out in front of him. He reached behind him and fumbled trying to get it off while attentively ensuring all blows landed on his shield instead of him. Vanna put her bow over her shoulder so both her hands would be free.

"Catch!" he said, throwing it up to her.

Vanna opened his pouch as soon as it was in her hands and reached inside, feeling around for the bombs. The search became easier when Link yelled up that they were in a bag, which she promptly found and pulled out. She sat his pouch and the bag down on the wall and got out one of the bombs. Once she'd attached the bomb to an arrow, she yelled for Mahana and Link to get back, aimed toward a fire that a Bullbo was being cooked over, and she loosed the bomb arrow. The blast was, quite literally, deafening. She could hear nothing but white noise as Bulblins were sent flying in flames.

Only about fifteen Bulblins were left after the explosion. Though the battle wasn't over yet, relief was almost palpable in the air. Fifteen was doable.

She used her last arrows to shoot two of them, and Link and Mahana split the rest between themselves. What tension remained melted away when Link sliced down the final Bulblin. Vanna's hearing came back on just as it exploded away, and the first thing she heard was Mahana sighing heavily.

"I'm sorry for getting us caught. I should've been more cautious..." Mahana said.

She looked down at herself, and Vanna looked her over as well. Blood was seeping out of cuts along her arms and torso, though most of them looked to be superficial. Link, on the other hand, had fewer cuts overall—only two that Vanna could see on his left arm—but both looked to be bleeding more than all of Mahana's combined.

Mahana clapped Link on his right shoulder, making him wince. "For a puny boy like yourself, you did a great job." She walked over to Vanna and looked up with a smile on her face. "And I can't thank you enough for bombing all those Bulblins even when they should've been my responsibility."

"And I can't thank you enough for putting me up on this wall where none of them could get me," Vanna said, smiling back at her. "But, um... Can you help me get down?"

Mahana laughed and held her arms up. Vanna deliberated on ways to go about getting into her arms that didn't involve jumping, and settled on just sitting down so Mahana could reach her sides. When she was back on the ground, she brought Link's pouch over to him and bandaged his arm while Mahana went to search for the key they needed.

Mahana came back to them with a key in one hand and a bunch of arrows in the other as Vanna was finishing securing Link's bandage. "Here. You'll need these," she said, holding the arrows out to her. "Now let's go get the girls."

"Do you want me to bandage your cuts?" Vanna asked as she stashed the arrows in her quiver.

Mahana started off back toward the ramshackle structure the girls were being kept in. "It can wait."

Vanna would have responded that blood loss doesn't care about whether you think it can wait or not, but Mahana's long legs had already brought her right up to the locked doors. Link and Vanna made it to her as she pushed the doors open.

Sitting along one of the walls in the dark room across from a Bullbo were the girls.

"Kira!" Mahana called, running in.

Link and Vanna followed her inside, though Vanna stayed closer to the doors where more light was able to come through the gaps in the planks of the doors and walls. Though it was dark, it was clear to see that the girls all looked quite similar despite their variety of ages, but more important than their similar appearances was the shared terrified expression on all of their faces. Even Kira, decidedly the oldest girl of the bunch, still looked scared as Mahana dropped down to her knees and pulled her into a hug.

"Mahana," she started, voice warbling.

"I never should've left you in the town alone knowing—"

"Mahana."

"—that they could do something like this."

Kira gasped as her wide eyes fell on Link. "Watch out!"

Out of the pitch-black corner of the room, a Bulblin appeared wielding a giant axe. It was one Vanna had seen before—the behemoth one that had ridden into Kakariko Village and run off with a gravely injured Colin.

Link was only halfway turned toward the Bulblin when he swung his axe, hitting Link and throwing his body across the room. The girls let out shrill screams as Link almost hit them, and a toddler started to wail.

Mahana jumped to her feet, swords at the ready. "Vanna, Kira, get the girls out of here! I'll take care of him!"

Vanna wanted to stay, to help—it felt wrong to leave her to fend for herself when Mahana was injured and she was fine—but before she could protest, Kira was shoving the crying toddler into her arms and several of the smaller girls were already crowding around her legs and clutching at her pants. With the Bulblin angry, roaring, trying to get past Mahana to the girls, it seemed she didn't have much of a choice but to take them and go. She took one last look at Link, crumpled on the ground, and then they ran.

They didn't get too far away from the building before they stopped to wait for Mahana and Link to join them. Vanna would have led the girls all the way out of the encampment in case the Bulblin got out, but Kira insisted on staying close enough to hear how Mahana was doing in there. To calm her fears of the Bulblin getting out, Vanna reattached the padlock on the doors again. It seemed like he could break right through the building with his axe if he wanted to, lock or no lock, but the extra precaution couldn't hurt.

With the exception of the young ones Kira and Vanna were holding, they all stayed standing, ready to run farther away if need be. Despite some of the girls appearing to be in their early teens at the latest, Vanna was still shorter than a number of them, particularly Kira. Only the very young girls looked like normal kids to her, ignoring their golden eyes and cherry-red hair.

As the minutes passed without any sign of either Mahana or the Bulblin winning or losing, the toddler continued to sob uncontrollably in Vanna's arms while the other girls whispered among themselves. The only word that she could make out from any of their conversations was Mahana, the rest being from an unrecognizable language.

A gurgling roar and a thump from inside the building quieted everyone. A few seconds later, it sounded like the gate on the opposite side of the building slammed shut.

And then, in almost the blink of an eye, the building went up in flames.

Vanna nearly dropped the toddler into another girl's arms and ran up to the double doors, the only part of the building that had yet to catch fire. Behind her, some of the girls yelled, telling her to stay away.

"Link and Mahana are still in there and I locked them inside!" she yelled back.

It was only as she got up to the lock that she realized she didn't have the key. She pulled at the lock anyway, hoping it would give. She could see Mahana come up to the other side of the door through the gaps.

"Where'd you put the key?!" Vanna said.

"You need to move! I'm getting us out!" Mahana said.

"But—!"

"Move!"

Vanna gave in and backed out of the way. She heard a Bullbo squeal, and then boards of the doors exploded outward as it rammed its way right through them. It was still running, knocking down gates that blocked the way to the Arbiter's Grounds, when Mahana ran out of the hole it created with Link slung over her shoulder.

She brought him over near the girls and laid him down on the sand. Vanna sat down next to her at Link's unconscious side while she dug through her pouch.

"Was hoping I could save this for the prison," Mahana said.

When Vanna saw the top of the glass bottle she was pulling out of her pouch, she assumed there would be a potion inside of it, but she was wrong. There was no liquid in the bottle, but rather a glowing ball of pink light with insect-like wings.

"Is that ... a Fairy...?" she asked.

"Clearly." Mahana opened the bottle, and the little Fairy floated up out of it. "Heal him," she instructed, pointing at Link.

The Fairy fluttered over to Link. Outside of the bottle, it was more clear that she wasn't just a glowing orb with wings. Vanna saw a tiny body encompassed by the radiant pink light. She held out a little wand and flew over Link's body, flicking her wrist and sending sparkles at him from her wand. Link's brows drew together and a quiet groan escaped him. Slowly, his eyes blinked open.

A tinkling bell sound came from the Fairy, and she flew over to Mahana. Mahana told her that she was okay, but the Fairy flicked her wand at her regardless. Vanna peeked over from Link to see the blood trickling from Mahana's wounds come to a stop as her skin grew back together. The Fairy gave off one final tinkling noise before zooming off into the night.

"Wow," Link whispered. He sat up and stretched himself out. "I've never been healed by a Fairy before."

"It's amazing, isn't it?" Mahana said. "Hopefully we won't need one in the Arbiter's Grounds. But first... We need to get you girls home."

"You're really going inside the Arbiter's Grounds?" Kira asked, frowning. "Can't I help?"

Mahana stood up along with Link and Vanna. "Your help isn't needed, Kira. I'm taking these two with me. I know they look like they couldn't stand a chance against flies, but they helped me break in here and fight the Bulblins to save you. This boy swings a sword like you wouldn't believe, and—"

"You really helped save me?" Kira interrupted, clasping her hands in front of her chest and smiling down at Link.

Mahana didn't let Link answer, saying a monotone, disapproving, "Kira."

Kira pouted. "I was just going to thank him!"

"You should be thanking all three of us, not just him. Now come on, girls. It's way past some of your bedtimes. Link, Vanna, you can go up by the prison and wait for me to come back."

Mahana scooped up two of the young girls in her arms and went to make her leave. The other girls followed behind her with the exception of Kira, who glanced back and forth from Link to the leaving group. Quickly, she grabbed his face in her hands, bent down, and pressed her lips to his.

Vanna wouldn't have been surprised if she spontaneously combusted just like the building had.

Kira pulled away giggling, and after giving him a coy smile and wave, she ran off to join the group. Link gawked after her with a goofy smile, wide-eyed, cheeks flushed, mouth red from her lipstick.

He cleared his throat and looked at Vanna, trying to hold back his grin. "So," he said, voice a higher pitch than normal, "uh, let's go wait up there...?"

Vanna simply nodded, clenching her fists and hoping he couldn't see the raging jealousy boiling inside her. They walked down the path to the Arbiter's Grounds, Link with his head down, and Vanna looking over at him every few seconds. He was smiling all the way there.

She couldn't blame him for his reaction—Kira was a beautiful, fit, scantily clad girl. Vanna probably would've been acting the same as him if Kira had kissed her instead. It was perfectly understandable for him to be all smiles, especially considering that he'd likely never kissed anyone.

Still...

Once they were sitting down at the bottom of the stairs that went up to the Arbiter's Grounds, the flames of jealousy had mostly flickered away. Vanna was left more jealous of Kira's boldness than anything.

Midna rose from her shadow and plopped herself down on the sand across from them. If she noticed anything off about them, she said nothing of it. "Looks like we're finally here... There's something I wanna tell you two before we go in." She took in a deep breath and brought her eyes to Vanna. "But you're not as caught up as Link is. Remember how a few weeks ago he told you about the Triforce and its long history?"

Vanna wondered what Midna of all people had to do with the Triforce. "Yeah?"

She looked down at her lap. "Well... He skipped over some information you should know. The Triforce is from the Sacred Realm, and long ago, magic wielders using the power of the Fused Shadows attempted to take the Triforce for themselves so they could rule the Sacred Realm..." Her hands balled up into fists in the sand. "And they were banished. They were chased across Hyrule and driven into another realm by the Goddesses. It was another world entirely... The antithesis of Hyrule, where the sun shines bright."

Her hold on the sand loosened, and she grinned ruefully as she described the other world, the Twilight Realm, in poetic detail. The way she spoke of twilight and shadows made the dots connect in Vanna's head, and she had already inferred where this was going before Midna confirmed her unspoken guess.

"This is the history of the Twili as it has been passed down from our ancestors... Do you now understand what I am?" Midna's voice went from being uncharacteristically gentle to surprisingly terrifying as she shot up into the air and snarled at them. "I'm a descendant of the tribe that was banished to the Twilight Realm!"

Vanna stared up at her in stunned silence, thinking she should say something but having no idea what she could say that wouldn't upset Midna further. Midna simmered down slowly over a minute and let herself fall back down to the ground. She looked any direction other than their way.

She sighed heavily. "The Twilight Realm was a peaceful place ... until Zant took control and transformed all of the Twili into Shadow Beasts. He somehow gained a great evil power previously unknown to our tribe... In any case, I was sent away, and he thought I could no longer get into the Twilight Realm without his power. ...But he's wrong. A tale told by my people says that though the Goddesses forbade us to return to the world of light, they left one link between the light and the darkness: the Mirror of..."

Midna's eyes trailed up above Link and Vanna suddenly and narrowed. Following footsteps from behind them, a voice carried to Vanna's ears. It was a simple, chipper, "Hey, guys," and it sent her heart racing. She turned her head as if she needed to see it to believe it.

"What a coincidence to see you here!" Zi said from the top of the stairs.

Chapter Text

Vanna and Link both shot up off the stairs, and he pushed her behind him. Zi smiled and started walking down to them.

"Calm down, Link. There's no need to play hero," he said. "And holy shit, Midna, you're a lot freakier in real life."

Midna floated next to Link in front of Vanna and put her hands on her hips. "You're not leaving with her. We've got stuff to do here, so get out of our way or I'll make you."

"I'm not here to take her. Not right now."

"If you're not here to take me, then why have you been trying to track me down?" Vanna asked.

"Am I not allowed to try to spend time with my best friend?" he said.

Vanna glared up at him as he approached the bottom of the stairs. "Why would I want to spend time with someone who wants me dead?"

He sighed. "I don't want you dead."

"Then don't take me back!" Vanna said. He started to talk, but she cut him off. "Don't you dare try to say that you don't have a choice because your dad will disown you or whatever if you don't take me back. You do have a choice. You'd just rather get to live the rest of your life comfortably than save mine."

"Because I can't save yours anyway. When I went back to my dad and talked to him after I last ran into you, he was furious with me for letting you get away. He made his own NEVA so he can come get you if I can't bring you back by myself. You're dying whether I do anything or not, and I wanna make this easier for both of us."

Link took a step closer to Zi. "Neither of you are takin' her back."

"Ooh, he can talk," Zi said. "Why don't you be the mute you're supposed to be and stay out of this?"

"Stay out of her life," Link said slowly.

"Don't you have a skeleton to go stab or something, short shit?"

"You're the only skeleton he'll be stabbing if you try anything," Midna said.

Vanna's heart started to race even faster. When Link had said he would protect her from Zi, she hadn't imagined how he would protect her. Despite her ever-increasing resentment toward Zi, she was horrified at the thought of Link stabbing him, killing him. Zi didn't deserve to die because of his misguided loyalty to his dad, and she couldn't imagine putting his sweet mother through the pain of losing her only child.

"You can't kill him!" she shouted.

Link didn't look back at her as he responded. "I won't kill him. But if I gotta hurt him to save your life, I'll do it."

"Good news that I'm not trying anything then, as I said," Zi said, words too cheerful for the conversation they were having. "Right now, I'm here to spend some time with Vanna and explore this world while I still can, 'cause when we do eventually go back, one of the NEVAs is being handed over to authorities and the rest are being recycled."

"What?" Vanna said. "Why does your dad keep on wanting to destroy his own inventions? First me, now NEVA...?"

"Because you're both similar. Awe-inspiring on the surface, but with 'incalculable hazards' lurking beneath," he said, rolling his eyes. "His words, not mine. Beats me what he thinks you could do. You're like 3'6" and you weigh basically nothing. But NEVA... Look what it did to you. Dragged you into some weird alternate dimension. Imagine if it dropped someone into space or something. One malfunction could kill someone instantly, and just one person misusing it could destroy our whole universe. He says he can't with good conscience give any NEVA a chance of getting out into the wrong hands, and having only one, that's going right to authorities, narrows the chances down. Only people in the government facility it's going to will be allowed to know that it even exists."

'Mr. Rider wouldn't know good conscience if it slapped him in the face,' she thought. "That's stupid! Of all the people to trust it with, he's still trusting the government? Who knows what they'll try to do with it! And you can't just hide something like the first time-traveling device from people!"

"It won't be hidden from everyone. You have no idea how many discoveries are hidden from the public. NEVA won't be the first, it'll be far from the last, and it won't be nearly as important a discovery as other hidden findings have been. Besides, the government backed the funding for its creation. I think they kinda have a right to it."

"And I think Vanna has a right to live," Link said, "but he still thinks it's okay to kill her for no reason. I don't get it. She did nothin' wrong."

"Where we come from, robots don't have rights, so—"

"She's a person," Link said.

"I know she is—but the rest of our world doesn't think so," Zi said. "And I don't know how much you know about technology, hillbilly, but when pieces of technology don't do things the way they're supposed to, they're considered glitched. Broken. It was agreed upon by everyone who had a part in making her that she'd be shut down if she became glitched the way she did."

"But I'm not glitched! There's nothing wrong with me!" Vanna said. She took in a deep breath to try to compose herself, but it didn't help much. "I was created to act like a human and now your dad wants to kill me because I do!"

Zi frowned. "I don't think either of us wants to believe it, but you ... really are kinda glitched, Vanna. There were two specific ways that you weren't supposed to act like a human, and you did both of them, and that's why he wants to kill you. You broke the law, for starters—which my dad actually decided to forgive—but then you lost your shit when you found out that you're a Synthuman. You acting the way you did goes directly against how you were programmed to behave. You were never supposed to do anything illegal, and you were supposed to stay calm and accept the truth like it was no big deal, not start crying and screaming."

She clenched her fists and narrowed her eyes at him. "Well I've accepted the truth now, so you can tell your dad that he can leave me the hell alone."

"Okay, one—no, you haven't accepted it. You're still upset about it. And two—it's too late now. It's not about whether or not you accept yourself now, it's about the fact that you didn't accept it at first when you were supposed to." Zi huffed and shivered, air coming out of his mouth in a white puff. "Look... I know you guys have to get inside this temple to continue on with your little quest to save the world, and since we all know I'm not leaving, let me come with you. I promise I won't try to run off with you right now if we can just spend a little more time together."

Midna and Link both looked back at Vanna for an answer. She gaped, trying to decide what to say. Zi's betrayal had yet to fully taint her perception of him, and somewhere deep down, she still considered him her best friend. As much as she hated it, as much as she wanted to tell him to go to hell and leave her alone, she couldn't deny that she missed him.

"I... I guess I trust he won't try to kidnap me as long as you two are next to me," she finally said.

Midna turned back to Zi and leaned closer to him. "Then you can come with us for now, but just remember that while Link might be too scared to kill a human being unless he absolutely has to, I have no problem with zapping you to dust the second you even think about getting in the way of my plans."

Zi pushed the sleeves of his jacket up and showed off his bare arms. "I got myself a magic pouch when I was in Castle Town. Both NEVAs are in there, and you'll be able to see if I reach for them." He lifted the side of his jacket then, revealing the pouch strapped to his belt and patting it. "If we've got a deal, then let's go inside already. It's way warmer in there."

"But we have a friend that's supposed to meet us out here soon," Vanna said.

"I'm sure your friend will realize you just went inside," Zi said. "Come on. I can tell you're cold in that outfit, Van. Looks nice, by the way."

Zi gave her a shit-eating grin before turning and taking the stairs two at a time. Vanna crossed her arms over her chest and followed after him. Link caught up to her at the top of the stairs, green tunic in his hands, and he held it out to her. She could have turned down his offer given that she had clothes of her own in her pouch, but she liked the idea of wearing something of his more than she probably should have.

Vanna thanked him and accepted the tunic, then put it on after stashing her bow away. The material was almost uncomfortably sturdy, scratchier than she'd have liked, it could have used a good wash, and it was too big on her, but wearing it made her feel all fuzzy and warm.

They stopped at the end of the hallway leading inside and sat down against the walls, Zi across from Vanna, Link, and Midna. It was quiet and awkward with none of them saying anything. Vanna busied herself with moving her belt above Link's tunic on her waist and putting on her socks and boots, and her necklace from the Zora outfit, but after she was out of things to do, she couldn't stand the silence for long.

"So, how'd you even get all the way back here? Teleport right past the Bulblin camp?" she asked.

Zi made a noise of exasperation and smiled. "Wasn't that easy. I've had a hell of a time trying to get here over the past few days. NEVA can't teleport to places by name here, so I've had to go by distances instead, teleporting a few hundred feet at a time until I got to wherever I wanted to be. I accidentally teleported into Gerudo Town, got jailed and I might be a dad now, and then I—"

"Uh, gonna have to stop you there," she interrupted him. "You..."

"Yeah, someone oughta teach the Gerudo more effective punishments for trespassing," he said. Vanna stared at him in silence, and he broke out into laughter. "Hey, they gotta have babies somehow with them never giving birth to any males of their own."

"They don't give birth to males?" she said, shocked that she'd missed out on such a fundamental trait of their race. She had so many questions to ask Mahana when she arrived.

"Well, apparently they do, but only once every hundred years or so. Anyway, I teleported out of their jail, came here, almost got killed by Bulblins, and that's basically it. I set this place as a base on NEVA so I could get back here easily, and I've been checking every now and again to see if you'd made it here. I've mostly been traveling around, and going back home to talk to my dad between checks because I can't get signal here." He pulled out his phone and unlocked it. "It just won't... Oh, so now it wants to work."

"You've got signal?"

"Yeah. It's not strong, but it's there. Maybe because I'm near your phone and your phone's been able to keep signal this whole time...?"

"My phone finally died about a week and a half ago."

Zi pursed his lips. "Hm."

She knew him well enough to tell that he wanted to say something more, but he didn't. He put his phone back after sending a text, and then it became quiet again. The awkward silence was sporadically broken by impatient grumblings from Zi, and Link's yawns as he struggled to stay awake.

Vanna sighed when she finally heard footsteps nearing the temple. As they got closer, it became obvious that there was more than one person coming in. Before they came into view, Zi, Link, and Vanna stood, and Midna disappeared into Vanna's shadow.

It turned out to be both Mahana and Kira. Kira, spear and shield at her back, smiled at Link before her eyes landed on Zi. Her smile widened, but Mahana glared at him.

"I heard that a boy matching your description illegally entered our town yesterday and escaped from jail," Mahana said.

Zi shrugged with a convincing poker face. "Wasn't me. I'm a law-abiding citizen."

Mahana still looked suspicious of him. "Who are you?"

"This is my ... friend, Zi, and he's coming with us," Vanna answered. "Zi, this is Mahana, and..."

"I'm Kira, her little sister that annoyed her until she let me come along," Kira said, smiling and holding her hand out to Zi. "Nice to meet you! It's not often I come across boys as tall as me."

Zi smiled back at her and shook her hand. "And it's not often I come across girls as tall as me."

Kira giggled, and Mahana groaned. "You're not here to flirt with every male you see, you're here to help," Mahana said to her.

Kira humphed and dropped Zi's hand. "Wasn't flirting," she murmured. "...Shall we get started?"

It took only a few short steps for them all to exit the hallway, and they were left on a small extension of stone. The first challenge of the temple presented itself—most of the flooring in the room was gone, taken over by sinking whirlpools of sand.

Link was quick to pull out his clawshot. "We can all take turns with this latching onto that grate on the wall over there to get across this gap, and then we should be able to jump over the smaller gaps from there."

"Yeah, you all can have fun with that if you want to, but I'm not about to fall and drown in sand." Zi retrieved one of the NEVAs from his pouch and put it on. "NEVA, activate. Teleport: sixty feet forward."

In the blink of an eye, Zi disappeared from where he was and reappeared sixty feet away, past the treacherous floor and past the closed gate that blocked the hallway across the room. Vanna was the only one not shocked by his action.

"How did he do that?!" Kira asked.

"Magic!" Zi called.

"Science," Vanna said.

It was hard to tell what exactly he was doing because the gate partially obscured him, but it looked like Zi put both NEVAs on the ground in front of him. It was even harder to hear what he said because of the moving sand, but it became clear when both NEVAs appeared on the floor in front of the group.

"You can take turns getting over here with them," he hollered over.

Kira reached down and picked one up while Vanna picked up the other. Vanna handed the one she had to Mahana and instructed them both to put them on, face Zi, and close their eyes. They were reluctant, but they complied.

"What do we have to say to make them take us over? Nee-ba, activate...?" Kira said.

"You two don't have to say anything. Just let me say it, and both bracelets will respond," Vanna said. "NEVA, activate. Teleport: sixty feet forward."

As Zi had, they both disappeared and reappeared across the room, and then Zi sent the NEVAs back over once more.

Link hesitated after grabbing one. "Vanna..." he said quietly.

"I know it looks scary, but I promise they're safe," she said.

"No, that's not..." Link shook his head and looked at her with a frown. "You've been going along with us in hopes that Midna will be able to get your bracelet back so you can have the chance to leave and be safe. But you have one right now..."

"Oh."

She could leave.

It would take just one short prompt spoken quietly so Zi couldn't hear where she was headed to. She could go back to her world, sometime in the past or future, and live out her life without having to worry about Zi or Mr. Rider ever again.

And without ever again seeing Link, or the Hero's Shade, or Uli, Rusl, Fado, Beth, Talo, Malo, Luda, Renado, Mahana, Zoras, Fairies, Light Spirits, or even Ilia or Midna...

"I'm not leaving."

Link's brows raised. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure," Vanna said with a reassuring smile. "Zi might be a pain, but I don't think he's so much of a pain that it justifies taking such a drastic measure to get away from him. Not yet, at least. Do you want to get rid of me?"

"No, no! I just ... want you to be safe," he said innocently.

"Can you guys, like, hurry up?" Zi shouted.

Vanna finished strapping her bracelet on and gave Link a look that told him to finish putting his on, too. Once he did, she closed her eyes and commanded the NEVAs to teleport them forward. The second they were finished teleporting over, she removed her bracelet; as long as she had it on and it was close enough to pick up Zi's voice, he could make it take her right to America, right to his dad.

Zi took both NEVAs back and stuffed them into his pouch before they started up a staircase with him and Kira taking the lead. If the question Kira asked him involving how his dad was a warlock was any indication, it seemed that Zi had given her a sensationalized explanation of NEVA during what little time they'd had before Link and Vanna had come over. Vanna would have told her the truth were it not so amusing to hear Zi's embellishments.

"...He's just always kinda had a knack for inventing spells, and—what?" Zi stopped in his tracks at the top of the stairs. "This ... is wrong."

"What do you mean?" Kira asked.

"That vat of oil is supposed to be in a little room off to the side, and there's supposed to be another little room off to the other side with the key to the door in it," he said.

"How do you know how this prison is supposed to be laid out?" Mahana asked.

"...I have foresight? But... A lot of reality doesn't line up with what I foresee," Zi said.

"So you're the son of a powerful warlock and yet you're just a bad fortuneteller. Tough luck." Mahana pushed her way between Kira and Zi to continue farther into the room. She spotted and grabbed the key to the locked door sitting at the base of a column in the corner and looked back at Zi with a smug grin. "Looks like it really wasn't in a room off to the side after all."

"The corner's close enough," Zi grumbled. "Link, if you've got a lantern, you should fill it up with that oil before we go on. The next room is really dark and we'll need to see so we don't get eaten by quicksand or stabbed by little skeletons."

Vanna ended up refilling her lantern with oil as well, though she doubted they would need two separate lanterns what with her having a glowing necklace and Zi having a flashlight on his phone. As Zi 'foretold,' the following room would have been exceptionally dark were it not for their lanterns and Vanna's necklace. Two sconces were beside the door they came in through, and a single sconce was above the door on the opposite side of the room, though all of their flames gave little light.

"There are supposed to be Stalchildren in here, you say?" Mahana said.

"I swear they're in here," Zi said. "We have to light the torches over there, and they're gonna pop up on the way over..."

He snatched the lantern from Vanna's hand and ventured forth, holding the lantern out in whichever direction he wanted to look in. Right when he turned his back on a patch of sand, it shifted as if a burrowed Moldorm was about to jump out. Instead, six tiny skeletal creatures emerged from the sand wielding spears.

Vanna hadn't thought they would be too frightening, but they were. It was one thing to imagine them, and another to see animated skeletons walking around with your own eyes. Their childlike proportions did nothing to make them less creepy. If anything, that made it worse, because she couldn't help but wonder if they had once been living children that wound up imprisoned alongside the worst criminals in Hyrule.

"They're behind you!" Kira shouted.

Kira's warning reached Zi too late; one of them jabbed a spear into the back of Zi's calf before he was able to turn all the way.

"Ow, you little asshole!" Zi yelled.

The Stalchild almost seemed to laugh, but that laughter turned into a high-pitched shriek when one swift kick from Zi broke all its bones apart. The pieces turned to dust as they hit the ground. It was so pathetic how easily it went down that Vanna kind of felt bad for it.

Link shoved his lantern toward Vanna, and once it was out of his hand, he reached for his sword and ran with Kira to Zi's defense. Zi had suffered a few more jabs to the legs before they made it to him, but he had also managed to kick two more of the remaining Stalchildren out of existence on his own.

"There's more where they came from," Zi said as the last one went down. He looked over at Vanna and Mahana, irritated. "Thanks for helping."

"I was busy holding this lantern," Vanna said.

"I was busy not caring," Mahana said. "I don't think there's a weaker monster in the world than a Stalchild. Their spears are like pencils."

Zi bent over and pulled up his pants, showcasing the pinpoints on his legs with blood dripping from them in thin lines. "Look at those!"

"They're barely bleeding," Mahana said with a shrug.

"They wouldn't be bleeding at all if their spears were really like pencils!"

"You've just got thin skin. And one's about to poke you in the ass."

The laughter Vanna had been holding back came out when it did.

Zi stayed more vigilant after that, making sure to back off and let Link and Kira take care of the Stalchildren as they came on their way to the other side. He and Vanna lit the torches beside the door, and the gate blocking the door drew up into the wall.

There was a burst of chilled air when Mahana opened the door. The change in ambience from the room they left to the room they entered was like the difference between day and night. The prior rooms had been warmer with warm-colored fires to match, but this one was cool, literally and figuratively. Four blue flames were atop posts along a grand staircase, and they bathed the room in their tone. There was something strangely beautiful and eerie about it at the same time.

"So, Fortuneteller," Mahana started as they came to a stop in the middle of the room, "which way will we go from here? Up the stairs and through the arch or through the doors to the right or left?"

"Any second now, some Poes are gonna come through the arch and a gate's gonna slam over it, so we'll have to go through one of the doors on the side to get the arch open again..." Zi smiled the kind of smile he always had when he was up to something. "Unless, we teleport right past the gate. I don't think we even have to bother with going through the doors. There's nothing important back there unless Link wants to collect all the Poe souls, but we won't really need those if we're teleporting past the gate."

"What do you mean by 'collect all the Poe souls'?" Link repeated.

Zi raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you collecting Poe souls?"

Link stared at him, equally as confused. "Why would I be collecting souls?"

"Because you're supposed to collect Poe souls to save Jovani...?"

"I've never come across a Poe or a Jovani in my life..."

"...You know, Zi, you're doing a good job affirming my suspicion that you're the worst fortuneteller ever," Mahana said. "I hear there's an actually competent one in Castle Town. You should see if she'll mentor you."

Zi crossed his arms. "Look, I'll admit I might have some details a little wrong, but if you think I'm entirely full of shit, then go try to walk through the arch."

Mahana smiled. "Gladly."

She headed for the arch, and it was as she placed a foot on the stairs that part of Zi's prediction first came true. Mahana paused as four lanterns floated out of the arch. Each lantern went to a blue flame, and one by one they swirled around them, stealing the fire from the posts and glowing blue with it themselves. When all four were lit, they circled above the posts in unison, and then a gate slammed down in the archway.

"Okay, so you have about a 30% accuracy rate," Mahana said.

"It's at least 90%!" Zi said.

The four lanterns came over to where Vanna, Link, Kira, and Zi were all standing close together, and they moved in a circle around them. Link and Kira got out their weapons, and Vanna handed Zi her lantern so she could get her bow and arrows ready. Three of them suddenly dispersed, leaving only one floating between them and Mahana. Vanna would have tried to shoot at the Poe, but she worried that because it was invisible, her arrow would go right through it and hit Mahana instead. Kira thrust her spear at it, yet her attack only made the lantern swing in place.

Zi grabbed Vanna and Kira and yanked them backward. "You can see it and attack it as a dog, Link! Go beast mode and get it!"

Mahana and Kira simultaneously made comments expressing bewilderment at Zi's statement, and Link took turns looking at each of them. "I haven't told either of you, but, uh, I can turn into a wolf...?" he said. "Midna, transform me!"

Midna's arm extended from Vanna's shadow holding the embodiment of Zant's curse and she flung it at Link. On contact, he began to transform. Even with the heads-up, both Mahana and Kira were astounded, and so were Zi and Vanna to a lesser extent. The bizarreness of it never fully went away to Vanna, and she was sure it was more bizarre to them getting to see it in person for the first time.

With a growl, Link lunged at the Poe. When he landed on it, it looked like he was floating in the middle of the air, and it looked like he was biting at nothing when he began to maul it. He was thrown off a few times, but each time he got back up until he was able to bring the Poe down.

A long, ragged white robe with a blue hood materialized on the ground next to Link, and what looked like steam escaped its holes as it deflated. The lantern fell beside it and shattered, freeing the blue fire from within. The flame floated its way back over to its place atop one of the posts.

"...You weren't kidding. You really turned into a dog," Mahana said flatly.

Link barked three times, and then was transformed back into a human. "Why does everyone say I'm a dog when I'm a wolf?"

"Same difference," Zi said. "So. As I was saying—"

"Link seriously just turned into a dog," Mahana cut in, eyes widening.

"Wolf," Link corrected.

Mahana threw her hands up in the air. "Dog, wolf, whatever! How? How could someone as amateur at magic as you do that? You can hardly even make a flame! And what was that 'Midna' thing about?"

"And what about that little orange and black thing?" Kira asked.

"The short of it is, it's not really my own magic that makes me transform. It comes from the orange and black crystal you saw, which was thrown at me and taken out of me by my friend, Midna," Link calmly explained.

"What friend Midna?" Mahana asked. "I see me, you, Kira, Zi, and Vanna here, and that's it."

"Or can only you see her, when you're a dog?" Kira asked.

Link turned from Mahana to Vanna's direction, and he looked down at her feet. "She's visible to humans, but she prefers to hide in shadows when anyone other than me or Vanna are around. Wanna come out, Midna?"

"No," came Midna's curt, disembodied voice.

"Just introduce yourself real quick, and you can go back into Vanna's shadow when you're done," Link said.

Midna groaned before coming out of Vanna's shadow. Mahana and Kira both gasped at the sight of her, and Midna crossed her arms. "My name's Midna. I'll be in Vanna's shadow, getting the crystal to and out of Link whenever he asks me to transform him. Bye."

With that, Midna dove down into Vanna's shadow. Mahana and Kira stared at it with their jaws slightly ajar.

"She doesn't like people much," Vanna said.

"That's obvious," Mahana said. "So... So, she's just been there in your shadow this whole time?"

"Yeah."

"Wait!" Kira said. "Do you think if she threw that crystal at one of us instead of Link, we'd get to turn into dogs, too?"

"The crystal only turns Link into a dog," Midna answered from Vanna's shadow. "If it touched you, you'd turn into a spirit and be stuck without a body for the rest of eternity."

"Aw," Kira said, pouting.

Mahana let out a long breath and shook her head. "People from outside of the desert are even weirder than I thought."

Zi clapped his hands together. "Well, now that we're all over that, can I finish what I was going to say so we can get through this place already?" He didn't wait for anyone to answer. "Link would need to kill the rest of the Poes to open the gate, but since I'm here, we can just teleport right past the gate. Aside from the Poes, all that's to the doors to the sides is the compass and a lot of other monsters that I think would be better to not mess with."

"Do you even know why I wanted to come here in the first place?" Mahana asked.

"No. You weren't in my prophetic vision. Neither were any of your people at all, for that matter."

"The monsters in this prison are radiating such a powerful evil aura that it's constantly awakening monsters all around it, and those awakened monsters have been attacking my people. I'm here to rid this prison of the evils inside it once and for all to put a stop to the onslaught we've been dealing with. That means killing as many monsters as I can."

"'Kay, well, you can do what you want," Zi said, shrugging. "I'm not getting my ass handed to me by a mummy, so I'll be here. You guys can go."

"...The monsters around this part of the prison actually aren't radiating too much of an evil aura," Link said, looking at Mahana. "I really have a feeling for that sorta thing, 'specially when I'm a wolf... Most of the aura is coming from deeper within the prison by only a couple of powerful monsters."

"It's probably the boss and the miniboss," Zi said.

"The boss and the miniboss?" Kira repeated.

"God, you guys need to invent video games," Zi said under his breath. "Minibosses are at the halfway point and are harder to beat than regular enemies, and bosses are the most powerful monsters in a temple that you fight at the end."

"It really might be better to just teleport past the gate," Vanna said. "This place is supposed to be off-limits, isn't it? If Link doesn't kill the Poes, the gate will stay closed, and that would keep people from getting too far in here."

"And it would keep the monsters beyond the gate from getting out," Zi said.

"And skipping over some monsters means there's less risk of us getting injured in here," Vanna finished.

Mahana pursed her lips and tapped her foot as she considered it. "...I suppose I could always come back to these rooms later on if killing the boss and miniboss doesn't make the Bulblins stop reawakening. Fine."

Zi reached down and grabbed the Poe's robe and stuffed it into his pouch. The rest of them asked him at the same time what he was doing, and he smiled. "I want a souvenir, duh. Now let's go! There's something in here I've been dying to play with."

Chapter Text

It was a momentary relief to leave behind the chilled air and blue fire, to get past the gate and into a warmly-lit hallway that didn't feel like it was haunted by invisible ghosts.

But just because they were beyond the Poes didn't mean they were past all the eeriness of the prison. The chamber at the end of the hall had its own eerie monsters, though they were at least visible, unlike Poes. Vanna remembered seeing them in Link's monster guide.

The book had called them Bubbles, but she personally would have called them just about anything else. The cutesy name didn't match the flaming, flying skulls with bat-like wings at all. As if they weren't creepy enough, she thought they were what a skeletal version of Ooccoo Jr. might look like, and she realized that she'd likely have the displeasure of looking at him again soon because he and his mother were always in temples.

To Vanna's surprise, Zi ran ahead of everyone else. She'd thought he would wait for someone to kill the Bubbles first. Instead, he reached into his pouch, pulled out a laser gun, and shot them down himself. He turned around when they were dead for good, unnecessarily blowing at the barrel of his gun before smiling proudly.

"Pretty impressive, eh?" he said.

Kira rushed up to him and enthusiastically asked what his gun was. While sitting down and finally taking the time to glue up the small punctures on his legs from the Stalchildren, he gave her an embellished answer much as he'd done with the rest of her questions. Vanna whispered to Link that he shouldn't believe anything Zi says about magic, to which he responded that it was obvious even with his own limited magic knowledge that Zi had no idea what he was talking about.

"So, do you think you could use your magic bracelet to get us over there past that gap?" Kira asked, pointing to one of the hallways. "I bet there's something useful in that chest."

Zi shrugged and stood up as he put the glue away. "Could, yeah, but there's not much reason to. We need to go down the opposite hallway to get something else, and going that way will lead us around to that door behind the chest."

"Are you really sure about that?" Mahana asked.

"Yes, I'm absolutely sure about this," Zi said.

Mahana hummed and walked up to the wall across where they'd come in from, which was missing a huge chunk. "What about the room past this? Do you know what's supposed to be back there?"

"It's got this thing, but you need this other thing we're gonna get for it, and we have to go through that door and around to get the thing so we can do that thing. But on second thought... I don't even think all of us could do the thing with the thing. We'll have to figure it out when we get there."

"Great explanation," Mahana mumbled.

Vanna stepped into a cavity in the middle of the floor that had cog-shaped grooves. Other tiles of the stone floor were cut out, revealing a series of cogs beneath. "What's up with this?"

"That's for the thing," Zi said. "If we don't have the thing, there's nothing we can do in here, so let's go get it already."

With that, they all made their way through the door, but they had to stop only a few steps into the short hall behind it. The floor ended and there was a long drop into the cylindrical room that they were near the top of. There were other holes in the wall like the one they were in every floor down, and in the middle of the room was a tall pole that stretched all the way up to where they were.

"Don't feel like breaking my legs today. Who's with me?" Zi said as he pulled out both NEVAs.

"They can bring us down?" Kira asked.

"I wouldn't have suggested using them if they couldn't," Zi said.

"But you can't be sure how far down that is... What if you tell it to take us farther down than the floor, or not down far enough? Will we appear in the floor or the air?"

"You think my dad didn't think of that? Nah. They take notice of your body and surroundings and automatically adjust where you'll land if you were about to appear inside of something or with your feet not on the ground. It can be kinda finicky if you're trying to go up, because it prioritizes bringing your feet to solid ground, so it might disregard your command if you try to tell it to bring you up and you didn't tell it to bring you up high enough. But in this case, it'll recognize that there's no floor a foot ahead of me where I'll tell it to bring me, so instead of bringing me a foot forward into the air where I'll just drop, it'll bring me down to the nearest floor a foot ahead of me, which is down there."

"...So, you're saying it's safe," Kira said slowly.

"It's safe." Zi looked down over the edge. "But, actually, if you want me to... This floor can be moved up and down by pushing that lever around the pole. I could go down there and move it up here if you'd rather not have to teleport."

"I think I'd like if you did that," Kira said in a small voice.

Zi turned to Vanna and held out one of the NEVAs. "Well, you know it's safe. Wanna go with me?"

Were Mahana and Kira not standing right there, Vanna would have told him that he wasn't as clever as he thought and she wasn't going to fall for his trap. There was no way she would willingly put on a NEVA around him when he could tell it where to bring her. "Thanks, but no thanks."

He stared at her in silence for a moment, and she knew he knew what she was thinking. "I can disable voice control on yours so you can input the command yourself."

But she'd still be trapped down there all alone with him. "I'll pass."

He sighed and looked from Link to Mahana. "Either of you wanna come with me? It'd be helpful to have someone lend a hand with getting the floor up here."

Mahana made a face that gave her answer for her.

"I'll go," Link said.

Even though he was the one who'd asked him in the first place, Zi was shocked that Link agreed. So was Vanna. It seemed like Link disliked Zi even more than she did.

Seeing them down there side by side—a symbol of her old life and her new one crossing paths—was uncanny and dreamlike. She couldn't keep herself from attempting to be nosy, and she was disappointed to realize that she couldn't tell what they were saying. She sat on the edge with her lower legs dangling off, hoping that being just a bit closer to them would help her distinguish their words, but it didn't.

Mahana sat down next to her. "That Zi boy isn't really your friend, is he?"

She shrugged. "It's complicated."

"Ah. What you're saying is, in shorter terms, no."

Vanna looked down at her lap as she toyed with the corners of Link's tunic. "What I'm saying is, it's complicated." She shrugged again, and before Mahana could potentially probe for more, she changed the topic. "So, you Gerudos don't give birth to males?"

While Link and Zi took their sweet time getting up to them, stopping and checking in every hole in the wall, Mahana tried to explain to Vanna just how Gerudo procreation worked. She said that the overwhelming majority of male Gerudo fetuses were simply incompatible with life, leading to half of Gerudo pregnancies being miscarriages and the other half being females. It was apparently typical that every hundred years a Gerudo would become pregnant with a viable male who would become king, yet they hadn't had a living male in almost 130 years. Since there was never a selection of their own males to mate with, most Gerudo women had children with Hylian men, and the traditional Gerudo appearance was so dominant that children hardly inherited looks from their Hylian fathers.

She also told Vanna about her and Kira's parents—their Gerudo warrior mother and Hylian ex-soldier father from Castle Town—and how they were out traveling, in spite of the less-than-ideal state of the country, now that she and Kira were old enough to live on their own in Gerudo Town. She guessed that they would be back soon, though, since she'd sent them a letter about the desert's Bulblin infestation. Kira piped in to talk about all the places their parents visited and how she wanted to go to them, too. She was just finishing describing the small beach village in the far south that their parents recently went to when Link and Zi got the floor to their level.

"That took long enough," Mahana said as they joined them again.

"This thing is way harder to push than it looks like," Zi said.

Mahana locked her fingers together and pushed her arms out, cracking her knuckles. "Then let me help. We'll be down in no time."

Mahana, Zi, and Link all worked together to push the lever around the pole while Kira and Vanna stood off to the side. Even if they wanted to help, the lever wasn't big enough for them to. Still, they were down all the way in a quarter of the time it had taken for Zi and Link to bring it up.

"We don't have a key, do we?" Mahana said when she noticed the locked door they were stopped by.

Link retrieved a key from one of his pouches. "It was in one of the other holes."

He was the one to unlock the door and the first to step through into the next room, but Zi got ahead of him and turned toward everyone after Vanna, Mahana, and Kira were inside.

"Forewarning, before we go any farther," Zi said. "There are three things in here that could kill us: giant spikes, a Redead, and ghost rats."

"Ghost rats?" Vanna said.

"Yeah, ghost rats."

"Ghost rats that kill."

"Okay, maybe they won't kill us, but I'll seriously vom if they touch me. Which is why I volunteer Link, our group ghost-seer, to kill them."

"I'll take care of 'em," Link said.

"And I also think that you should be able to see the giant spikes with your doggy senses, so once the rats are dead you should lead us through the room," Zi said.

"What do you think they are, ghost spikes?" Vanna said.

"I don't know. That's just how it is in my vision, which is correct, like, 95% of the time at this point."

"Where's the Redead you talked about?" Mahana asked.

"At the very end of the room, to the side with a chain we'll need to pull to get past that big slab in the middle back there," Zi answered.

"Should I go around and kill all the rats, then the Redead, and then come back to lead you guys past the spikes, or should we go together to start with and I'll kill the rats as we come across them?" Link asked.

"I think it'd be best if we all went together," Mahana said. "That way you won't have to face the Redead alone."

Kira and Vanna agreed that they should all go together, and Zi was last to reluctantly agree, though he insisted that he'd be staying behind all of them the entire time. Link had Midna transform him—eliciting shocked noises from Mahana and Kira when they noticed Midna's arm raise up out of Vanna's shadow—and then they were off with him leading the way.

Vanna wasn't sure if it was because he really could see the spikes as Zi said he would, or if there weren't any spikes at all in actuality, but either way, none came up. She did, however, have invisible rats jump up on her multiple times, and Link had to bite into them to tear them off her. Though she didn't have a phobia of rats like Zi did, she still ended up squealing in fright every time she felt small paws suddenly dig into her.

Near the end of the room, they stopped in their tracks. Lying on the floor near a pile of nonhuman skulls was a mummified monster, clasping a gigantic wrapped sword in its hands that were crossed over its chest. It looked like Zi had been wrong about two things—the first being that the monster was on the side with the chain they needed to pull, and the second being that the monster was a Redead. Again relying on what she'd learned from the monster guide, Vanna thought it had to be a Gibdo instead.

Not that the distinction mattered in that instant, really. Gibdo or Redead, she knew that she did not want to mess with it.

In lieu of barking three times, Link made three quieter vocalizations in a row. Midna asked from Vanna's shadow if that meant he wanted to transform, and after he nodded at Vanna, she quietly said yes for him. Midna's arm appeared out of Vanna's shadow again, and the crystal shot into her hand, turning Link back into a human.

"If we stay quiet and as far away from it as possible, it might not wake up," Link whispered.

"Where's that chain you said would be over here, Zi?" Vanna whispered.

"Um... I might have misremembered and it might be on the other side," Zi whispered. "But we had to come over here anyway to get through... You can't just cut right from the other side to the hall between because spikes are in the way."

"Except we can't get through anyway because of the slab, so we have to go back," Mahana whispered.

"We don't all have to," Link whispered. "Y'all go ahead up to the slab, and I'll stand here and watch until you're safe over there, then I'll go back and pull the chain myself. You can pass through once I've got it out of the way, and I'll run around and meet you. Just be really, really quiet while walking over..."

Link stayed put where he was while the rest of them formed a line to pass the Gibdo. They walked slowly, trying to place their feet on the ground silently with each step. Vanna held her breath and kept her eyes glued to the monster, watching for any signs that it was going to wake.

They were close to the hall—so, so frustratingly close—when the measures they took to be quiet proved to be worthless. Appearing to sense their mere presence, the Gibdo, without bending any limbs, rose to its feet.

They all had their weapons out in a flash. Not bothering to adjust her stance or ensure her aim was accurate as she would have under better circumstances, Vanna fired an arrow. She was close enough that her aim was spot on regardless. Her arrow went through the Gibdo's head right as Kira's spear prodded its abdomen and a laser from Zi's gun hit its chest.

Even being struck by a laser, impaled by a spear, and shot through the head with an arrow did nothing to prevent it from unhinging its jaw and releasing a blood-curdling, petrifying scream.

Vanna had thought there was reason to believe she would be impervious to its incapacitating shriek. After all, why would a robot entirely freeze up from a loud noise? At most, she'd assumed it would make her unable to hear for some time.

But like everyone else, she froze in place. The only part of her that moved was her heart, hammering away in her chest. Everything went silent, and her vision stayed locked on the Gibdo as it drew its sword back, preparing to swing.

Midna erupted from Vanna's shadow in front of her and thrust her arms forward, sending out the same orange arcs of electricity Vanna had seen appear in her hands that very first day when she'd destroyed NEVA. Rather than making the Gibdo turn to ashes as they had done to Vanna's bracelet, the arcs paralyzed it. Keeping her arms out in front of her, Midna looked back and said something, but Vanna couldn't hear most of it, and her eyes weren't focused enough on Midna's face to try to read her lips. Her hearing only came back to her in time to hear the last word, 'it,' which didn't help her deduce the rest of what Midna had said.

Vanna's desperate attempts to move came out as small spasms. Beside her, Mahana recovered her mobility, and she quickly sheathed her swords before picking Vanna up by her armpits and moving her still body up against a wall far enough away from the Gibdo that its sword couldn't get her. Vanna could see Link from where she was, and he was still frozen, too.

Both Kira and Zi had regained their mobility by the time Mahana had finished moving Vanna. Mahana and Kira ran around the Gibdo to attack its backside while Zi continually shot at its chest. Frustration made Vanna strain against her immobility even harder. Her spasms became stronger as a result, but she felt no closer to being able to properly move.

As the Gibdo began to darken, Midna let her arms down, and it fell to its knees in a black heap and exploded away. Out of the corner of her eye, Vanna saw Link start to move again. Seconds later, she broke free of her own paralysis so suddenly that she dropped her bow and fell forward. Zi chuckled, and she shot a glare up at him.

"Not fair," she said, looking from Zi to Mahana and Kira. "Why did you guys get your movement back faster than me and Link?"

"We're smaller," Link said as he walked over to her. "If your body's bigger, it takes a bigger curse to have more of an effect."

"That's bull," she grumbled. She didn't need any help standing up, but she grabbed onto and held Link's outstretched hand as she got to her feet anyway. Slinging her bow back over her shoulder, her eyes went to Midna where she was still floating in the air. "Since when can you freeze monsters in place and why have you never done it before?"

"I've always been able to. I just thought this guy deserved it for paralyzing all of you." Midna turned to look at everyone, said, "You're welcome," and then retreated into Vanna's shadow.

They took a moment to get their bearings before putting Link's plan back into action. Once they were all on the other side of the slab, heading toward a door that it had been blocking, Zi made a comment lamenting the fact that he hadn't even thought about teleporting right past all of the spikes and ghost rats and the Redead.

"Gibdo," Vanna corrected.

"What?" he said.

"It was a Gibdo."

"No, it wasn't!"

"It was bandaged like a mummy. Like a Gibdo."

They kept up their bickering through the door until they got to a long, narrow path that screamed 'death trap.' The floor was mostly quicksand, and on either side of the wall were spiky contraptions spinning back and forth along rails.

Zi stepped up, and after experimentally extending a leg over the sand, he turned back. "Looks like those of us who aren't challenged in the height department can just step right over to part of the floor that's safe from the spikes. There's no way the shorties in the room can get across on their own without having to trudge through the quicksand."

"I could carry you!" Kira offered to Link. "I'm stronger than I look!"

"I—I could probably—" Link started, hand going up to rub the nape of his neck.

"Or I could carry him, and you could carry Vanna," Mahana suggested. "Vanna's smaller. She'd be easier for you to carry."

Not giving Kira time to approve, and not asking if Link and Vanna approved either, Mahana scooped Link up into her arms bridal style. Kira was clearly dissatisfied to be stuck with Vanna. If Link didn't have to be carried by one of them, then Vanna would have preferred to be carried by Mahana, but she accepted being carried by Kira since it meant that she wasn't holding Link.

But the farther they went down the path, the more Vanna wished Kira would have carried Link instead. Dozens of large, black beetles appeared out of the sand. More of the bugs went toward Zi and Mahana ahead of them, but some went around and came for Kira. Kira screamed and nearly dropped Vanna when they started crawling up her legs. Mahana, on the other hand, didn't seem bothered by them at all.

At the end of the path, Zi and Mahana both went to the side of the room that had a door, but Vanna stopped Kira before she could join them. Opposite the door was a collection of skulls and pots, and she noticed the top of Ooccoo's head poking out of one of the pots. At Vanna's request, Kira stepped over there and hurriedly put her down, then flicked off all the beetles that clung to her.

Vanna got off all the beetles that had made their way to her as well, and then she flipped over the pot Ooccoo was in. Both Ooccoo and her son tumbled out of it as creepy as ever. They were actually almost worse than she remembered. Beside her, Kira made a disgusted noise.

"Gracious, it's you! It's been some time since we last met! How wonderful to see you!" Ooccoo said.

Vanna went ahead and pulled off her pouch and opened it up in front of her. "Yeah, it's ... nice to see you, too. Wanna come with?"

"Oh, are you not going to introduce me to your new friend?" Ooccoo asked. She waddled up to Kira, who flinched away.

"Um, h-hi?" Kira said. She gave Ooccoo a halfhearted wave. "I'm... I'm Kira...?"

"I'm Ooccoo, and this is my son, Ooccoo Jr.!" Ooccoo turned her head across from them, and Vanna looked back at Zi, Mahana, and Link as well. Zi and Mahana looked as disgusted as Kira did. "And those are more new friends over there, hmm?"

"Yeah. The woman's Mahana, other one's Zi." Vanna pushed her pouch out to her again. "Pouch?"

"Yes, yes, of course! Just let me know if you want to warp out!"

Ooccoo and her son flew into her pouch and Vanna put it back on her belt. Kira's expression relaxed some with them out of sight. She wordlessly picked Vanna up, walked over to the door, and put her back down.

"And I thought Midna was freaky in real life," Zi said, shuddering.

"You and Link really do keep strange company," Mahana said.

Vanna didn't voice what she was thinking because Kira still didn't know about her, but she thought that 'strange company' went hand in hand with being a werewolf-robot team.

Zi stopped everyone again when they were through the door, though they likely would have stopped on their own regardless. Up ahead was yet another death trap contraption, rotating around with its spikes threatening to stab anyone who walked through.

"See the door up on the far wall over there?" he said. "We have to get there, and to get up there, we need to go through the gate to the right and go up, but the gate only opens when you kill the three Stalfos down that ledge right across from us..."

Mahana nudged Vanna's shoulder. "You should be able to handle this by yourself."

"Huh?" Vanna grimaced up at her. "Stalfos... They're the big skeletons with swords and shields, right?"

"Right. They're like a stronger version of the Stalchildren we came across earlier. You can knock them apart with a sword all you want, but they'll just put themselves back together. The only thing that'll take them down permanently is a bomb."

Vanna glanced at Link. "Well, he's the one with bombs, so..."

"And you can take those bombs and put them on your arrows like you did to take down the Bulblins," Mahana said.

Excitement sparked in Zi's eyes, and he grinned widely. "You're doing it! Link, bring your bombs and come on!"

Zi grabbed Vanna by the wrist and started walking, pulling her along behind him. It was easy to forget about his darker motives when he was radiating such childlike joy, and it was impossible for her not to laugh.

He had to briefly let go of her so they could get down on their hands and knees and safely crawl underneath the spinning contraption, but he was right back to pulling her along once they were past it. They stopped at a ledge, and Link caught up to them a few seconds later. Down the ledge, atop a patch of sand, were two piles of bones, each with their own sword and shield.

"There's only two," Vanna said.

"Third one should be hiding in that little nook over there," Zi said, pointing. "I think someone might have to go down there to wake them up so you can blow them up... Link?"

"I need to stay beside her. I have to light the fuses so the bombs will go off," Link said.

"I'll light them," Zi said.

"You've got matches?" Vanna asked.

"No, but I can just use whatever Link uses to light them."

Link brought up his left hand, and a small flame flickered above his extended index finger. Zi's mouth fell open and his brows drew together. With a humph, he snapped his jaw shut and crossed his arms. Link dropped his arm and gave a small, satisfied smile.

"Or maybe I won't," Zi mumbled. He pursed his lips as he looked back to the piles of bones. "...But maybe you can shoot them while they're down?"

She didn't think it could hurt to try. Vanna got an arrow out as Link took out a bomb, and she gave the arrow to him. He handed the arrow back to her with the bomb attached to the head, and she nocked it on her bow. Zi was nearly bouncing with glee. After giving him a warning to plug his ears, Vanna shot the bomb arrow between the piles of bones. It exploded with a deafening boom on impact with the sand, and the smoke cleared to reveal that the bones had been obliterated. She couldn't hear all of what Zi said, but his huge smile and playful shove were enough to tell her that he was impressed.

They had to jump down for her to aim at the final Stalfos, which she was also able to kill before it even woke. Mahana yelled to tell them that the gate had opened up, but Zi raised a finger to stop Link and Vanna from going back.

"I think I've actually got a better idea," he said. "C'mere."

Zi turned Vanna around and grabbed her sides. Thinking that he was about to force one of the NEVAs on her, she yelped and tried to pry his hands off of her, and Link's arms shot over to her. However, they both quickly realized that Zi's action was one of innocence—he lifted her up high enough that she could climb up a ledge to get to the door they were heading for.

"There you go," he said as he helped push her the rest of the way up. She looked down at him, and he was rubbing his hands. "Jeez, you two almost tore my hands off. I was just trying to be nice. We would've had to go through quicksand if we took the path the gate was blocking."

"You'll have to forgive me for not exactly trusting you to be grabbing me like that with no warning. You should've told me what you were doing first," Vanna said.

Zi frowned at her before sighing and looking back the way they'd come from. He called for Kira and Mahana to come their way, and they did. Mahana helped lift Link, Zi, and Kira up the ledge, and she reached and hauled herself up on her own.

"It's miniboss time! Death Sword! And when it's dead, we can finally get the thing I've been waiting for," Zi said. He shoved the door up, then looked back at Link. "Oh, you're gonna wanna be a dog for this."

They stepped into the darkest room of any that they'd been in yet, with no lit sconces or torches of its own to speak of. Were it not for Vanna's necklace, they—perhaps not including Link—wouldn't have been able to see anything at all, but even the glow from the pendant had its limits. The round room was so expansive that its light couldn't reach the other side, and Vanna could only barely make out something stuck in the floor in what appeared to be the middle of the room.

Following Zi's suggestion, Link had Midna transform him, and then they slowly started heading inward. As they neared it, Vanna realized that the object stuck in the floor in the middle of the room was a gigantic sword, longer than Mahana was tall. Numerous ropes were tied around its hilt and attached to the floor. Vanna grabbed her necklace and held the pendant out as far in front of her as she could, trying to see farther back into the room.

"...This is Death Sword?" she asked Zi, her voice echoing.

Zi got out his gun and shot at one of the ropes, making it snap in half. Unfamiliar characters engraved on the blade suddenly lit up a bright red-orange, and the sword jolted. Flames shot down each of the ropes, leaving nothing but ashes behind afterward. Inky fog erupted from the ground around the sword, and with a final jolt, it came flying out of the ground. It flipped around and stopped in midair as if it was being held by an invisible foe.

"That's Death Sword!" Zi said.

Link ran toward it and jumped astoundingly high, and much like the sword, he appeared to float in midair. His teeth looked to tear into nothing, reminiscent of when he had attacked the Poe earlier. When Vanna saw Mahana's hands inching to her swords in her peripheral, she decided it would be best to go ahead and get her bow ready, too. Whatever this Death Sword was, it was undoubtedly more of a threat than some lantern-holding swordless ghost. Judging by how he bailed and ran as far from it as he could, Zi must have agreed.

Link's body swung around in the air until a hard jerk made him lose his grip and fall off. In the blink of an eye, the monster became visible. Its appearance was worse than Vanna's worst expectation, nearly stunning her with fright. Given that all the monsters in the temple up until then were different types of skeletons, she would have guessed it would also be a skeleton, not some Grim Reaper demon ram. She supposed it was enough of a thematic fit, though, considering that it was hands-down the most terrifying monster she'd seen in Hyrule yet. She could hardly believe that she had once found Diababa, some stupid overgrown plant, to be horrifying.

Death Sword let out a grating scream before pulling back and levitating in the air. Its head lolled and arms dangled at its sides as it slowly circled them. Vanna lifted her bow and aimed at it, but her arrow missed because it moved out of the way at the last second. For the next shot, she was sure to aim a little more to its side, and its movement put it in just the right spot to be struck.

As expected, it wasn't happy about getting shot, and it started to fly around them rapidly, getting closer with each turn. Vanna nocked another arrow—though it would have been impossible to shoot if it maintained its speed—and Link quickly had Midna transform him again. He got his sword out just in the nick of time as Death Sword came to a halt to their right side. A quick stab made Death Sword drop its sword arm and hunch forward, opening itself up to a barrage of attacks.

It was remarkable, but more so aggravating, how it managed to not succumb to all the damage they inflicted upon it. Death Sword regained control of itself and flew back into the air to presumably repeat the process. This time, the four of them turned back to back in a coordinated movement so one of them would be facing Death Sword at all times. The way Vanna was facing left Zi in her line of sight; he was near the wall with his phone out, obviously taking pictures or a video.

When Death Sword flew around to her, she shot it again. It sped around them like the previous time, but it went so fast that it was a black blur. It stopped more abruptly than it had before, too. Not even a second passed between Vanna realizing that it had stopped circling, and hearing the whoosh of its sword and then Kira screaming.

Vanna turned with another arrow ready, and she tried as hard as she could to not look at Kira, to just focus on bringing down Death Sword, but her eyes were drawn to her. Kira had dropped her spear and fallen to her knees, and her right arm was a bloody mess. With relief at seeing that she was still alive, Vanna forced herself to turn her attention back to Death Sword. Link had run around in front of Kira and incapacitated it again, and he unleashed an onslaught on it. Vanna half-expected Mahana to run up and tear into Death Sword herself in retaliation for hurting her sister, but she was more concerned with getting Kira to safety, leaving Link and Vanna to fight it alone.

An arrow that struck directly between the eyes was Death Sword's undoing. With a scream that shook the room, it thrashed around, clawing at its head, and then it turned black. Unlike other monsters, it didn't explode away—its form disintegrated into hundreds of black moths that flew up and escaped through a hole in the ceiling.

Sconces spontaneously lit, providing light to the room and making the glow of Vanna's necklace obsolete. Link wasted no time running to catch up with Mahana, who was carrying Kira to the wall by Zi. After slinging her bow over her shoulder, Vanna followed behind at a normal pace. She wasn't looking forward to seeing just how bad Kira's injury was.

Kira was propped up against the wall, tears spilling down her cheeks and hiccupping for breath, and Mahana, Link, and Zi were looking over her when Vanna made it up to them. She stayed a few feet back, giving them space.

"You're lucky it didn't take your arm clean off," Zi said.

"Can't—can you use that glue you used on your leg earlier to close it?" Kira asked.

"Not on a huge cut like that, no."

"I should've made you stay home," Mahana grumbled.

"I can stitch it up," Link offered.

After Link got out the things he needed to suture her wound, Mahana and Zi cleared room for him to do so. Mahana stayed crouched by Link and Kira, watching over his work, while Zi came to stand by Vanna.

"We can't help them..." Zi said quietly. He pointed to an archway they hadn't been through, and he smiled. "But the thing is back there. Let's go get it."

Chapter Text

Vanna made Zi leave both NEVAs on the floor by Link, Kira, and Mahana before they went off toward the archway together. Past the arch, up a short flight of stairs, sitting on the ground, was the ... thing.

She'd thought Zi was just being intentionally vague, but 'thing' really was the easiest descriptor for it—it just looked like a giant metal top with gear-like protrusions on the upper part. Confused and frankly unimpressed, she asked him what it was. He excitedly told her that it was actually called the spinner, and then he tried to show her how to use it. He placed it on its point with his hands and one by one inserted his feet into openings on top of it. With his shoddy balance, the spinner wobbled beneath him, and he fell off multiple times simply trying to stand up. She couldn't stop the giggles that escaped her each time he did.

Not at all dissuaded by his failures, he continued to try. Finally, he managed to stay upright and take off on it. He directed it toward a rail on the wall, and as it made contact, the gears on top latched onto it. It rose off the ground when the rail inclined, going up through a wide opening above the archway they'd entered through and back into the miniboss room. Vanna ran out to watch as Zi zoomed along around the room high off the ground. Mahana and Link were so preoccupied with Kira that they didn't even notice when Zi passed by over their heads.

She went back through the archway when Zi finished his circle around the room, making it just in time to see him get thrown off again as the spinner came off the rail. He fell to the ground harder than he had the previous times, yet he was still smiling and laughing as he got to his feet.

Vanna had no desire to try it herself, fearful of falling off, so they walked back to the miniboss room together then. She led him to sit by the door instead of joining Link, Kira, and Mahana. Zi didn't care whether they sat with them or not, but she wanted to keep some distance. There were things she wanted to ask him about, and since he didn't have either of the NEVAs on him, she figured now was the best time.

"So, you brought glue with you," she said.

"Yeah. Why? Are you hungry?"

She rolled her eyes and chose to ignore that. "I have cuts on my legs. I know your dad has that kind of glue that works best for Synthuman skin, but I was wondering if what you have would work, too. Link stitched them up for me, but..."

Zi reached into his pouch, and his hand came out with the glue she'd seen Mr. Rider use before on his robots. "I brought some for you, too, just in case. Where are your cuts?"

Vanna pulled off her right boot and the bandage still wrapped around her calf while Zi got out a pocketknife. He used that to cut the stitches so he could pull them out, taking his time on each one.

It took her until he got to the second cut to gain the courage to ask him the first of her questions. "Your dad said when I tore myself apart, he wiped my memories again..." she started slowly. "Do you know what happened the first time?"

"Huh?" He stopped what he was doing and looked up at her face, but his focus went back to her leg after a second. "Oh, yeah, he did wipe your memories twice. The first time was after a day of thoroughly testing you out before 'officially' starting you up. Just making sure you were capable of performing basic tasks and responding as you should. He said you were really suspicious of why you woke up in the factory with him and why you had to show him that you could do things, so he couldn't leave you with those memories."

"Oh," she said quietly. That wasn't as bad as what she had believed it would be. Still, she hated that she couldn't remember it. "...Do you know if it'd be possible to restore my old memories?"

"Maybe. You know nothing ever gets completely deleted on computers, just a lot harder to access, so I guess it's possible." Zi shrugged, and Vanna felt herself tense up at how casually he'd referred to her as a computer. "But I don't see why you'd want them," he added under his breath.

"If a chunk of your life was missing from your memories, wouldn't you want those memories back?"

"Well, yeah, but trust me, you're not missing out with missing your memories. Do you really wanna remember yourself having a mental breakdown and ripping all your skin off and organs out?"

"Guess not..." Vanna mumbled. She frowned and looked away. "...What happened to my mom?"

"What do you mean?"

"I texted her a few weeks ago and told her that your dad is planning on killing me, and she read it, but she never responded..." She examined his face anxiously, looking for anything in his expression that would hint at her mom's state. "She's okay, right?"

"Yeah, she's fine. My dad kinda ... well, tampered with her phone as soon as he finished talking to you. He blocked all your incoming texts from showing and set it so they'd all be marked as read anyway. She hasn't actually read anything you sent to her."

Vanna looked back at Zi, brows furrowed. "Are you kidding me?"

He sighed and put the pocketknife down, finished with taking out the last of the stitches on that leg. "Look. I'm not saying I necessarily agree with my dad's actions ... but I get it. You have to think about your mom's well-being."

"What, you think it's best for her well-being to keep me from talking to her? She deserves to know what's happening!"

"Do you actually think it'd be best for her to know? Do you know how much it would break her to know that someone purposefully ended your life, especially if that very same someone is the one who brought you back to her in the first place? My dad thinks it'd be easier for her to cope if she thinks there was no foul play. He's gonna tell her you were destroyed in an accident here before we could bring you back."

Vanna glared at Zi in silence, so enraged she couldn't turn her thoughts into words. In a way, she could see where he was coming from; her mom probably would cope better thinking she was killed in an accident rather than murdered by someone she thought she could trust. Still, she deserved to know the truth, even if that truth would hurt her more than a lie. Vanna heavily doubted that Mr. Rider was really worried about how her mom would cope—he was worried that she'd be murderously angry with him if she knew.

Zi began to glue the cuts back together, silent as Vanna was for a few moments. "...She talks about you all the time," he said gently.

Her rage simmered down, morphing into the pity she felt whenever she thought of her mom's feelings for her. "Me, or her real daughter?"

"There's no difference to her."

She pursed her lips, wondering if now was the right time to ask another question that had been on her mind. "...What happened to her? To ... Vanna."

"She had some rare genetic disorder, and a lot of health issues from it. I don't remember exactly what it was called ... just that they couldn't do anything to stop it. I was so young when she died, I didn't really get it. I mean, she was so young, too—she'd only turned four a few days beforehand, and I didn't even turn four until a month afterward. I just remember she was born on February 8th, 2102, and died on February 13th, 2106."

February 8th—exactly five months before the day she'd always been told was her birthday. "If that's her birthday, then why do I have a picture of her on the day she was born that's labeled as being taken on July 8th?"

Zi looked up into her eyes and stared at her critically. "You're smart enough to figure this out. Think."

"...July 8th was the day I was powered on. This time, at least," she said. "So the date on the picture was altered to go with it?"

"Yeah. My dad wanted the day you were started up to be your birthday. On your first round, your birthday actually was February 8th, but then, you know... You had to be restarted later on."

She looked away again, having nothing else she wanted to say to him. He finished gluing the final cut on her right calf, and then she wordlessly pulled up the left leg of her pants so he could glue up the cut on her thigh from the Lizalfos in Lakebed Temple. When he was done with that one, he put the pocketknife and glue back in his pouch and pulled something else out. It was a little cloth bag tied shut at the top with a drawstring, and whatever was in there jingled as he threw it into her lap.

"Money. I don't think I'll be needing any more of it. You can give it to Link."

Vanna curiously opened it up. Inside were small and colorful hexagonal gems. For all the time she'd spent in Hyrule, she'd never actually seen a Rupee. She reached in and grabbed a handful, and as she removed her hand from the bag, they grew in her palm. Though they were all the same size, only about an inch from one end to another, different colors had different weights. They made satisfying clinks as she dropped them back in the bag.

Zi got up and walked back over to Mahana, Kira, and Link, holding the spinner in his arms. Vanna readjusted her pants and put her boots back on, then stashed away the money bag and followed after him.

She made it over to them while Link was putting things away and Mahana was trying to clean the blood off Kira's arm using a cloth and a waterskin. Kira had stopped crying, but her lips were still stuck in a pout.

"I got the thing," Zi said. "The spinner."

Link stood to get a better look at it. "That's the thing we need to get through here?"

"Yeah. It latches onto rails on walls, like the one up there." His hands full with the spinner, Zi used his head to motion for Link to look up. "It'll get you to places you can't walk to. Problem is, we can't all ride it together, and we can't really take turns on it to get us all to where we need to be. So, unless any of you have ideas, getting through here is kinda all a one-person job at this point."

"Why would we need that when your magic bracelets can get us to places we can't walk to?" Mahana asked, standing up and putting her things away. She helped Kira get to her feet beside her. "Can't we take turns with them?"

"We really shouldn't. It's fine to use the teleporting by distance function when you have a good idea of how far away you are from where you need to be, and when there won't be much of an issue if your guess is a little off, but that's not gonna be the case in the upcoming rooms. The layouts are complicated, and I don't think it'd be a good idea to risk miscalculating in rooms where most of the floor is covered in quicksand," Zi said.

"What about fighting the powerful monster you said would be at the end?" Kira asked.

"Also a one-person job. You need to be on the spinner for the battle, and anyone not on the spinner won't be of any help." Zi held the spinner out toward Link. "And according to my visions, you're the one supposed to fight it."

Link eyed Zi suspiciously and peeked at Vanna before grabbing the spinner.

"I hate to not be able to fight it myself... But I suppose you've shown that your foresight is adequate." Mahana sighed and put a hand on Kira's uninjured shoulder. "And I think you need to rest, now. We should leave."

Vanna reached into her pouch and felt around for Ooccoo and her son's miniaturized forms and pulled them out when she found them. Ooccoo plopped to the ground at her feet, and Ooccoo Jr. went down to float beside her head. "They can warp you out. Do you want them to?" she asked.

Mahana and Kira shared a look and both nodded, and then Mahana looked at Vanna. "Do you wanna come with us?"

She glanced from Link to Zi. "No, you two go ahead. I'll be sure to catch up to you with Link once the boss is killed."

"You can come to the retreat, too, Zi!" Kira said.

"Yeah, no," Mahana said. "Let's get out of here."

After Ooccoo bid Mahana and Kira farewell and reminded her son to come right back, Ooccoo Jr. started to fly in rapid circles while making his weird gibberish noises. Kira called out for Link to be careful before she disappeared along with Ooccoo Jr. and Mahana. Ooccoo Jr. returned seconds later by himself and went back to his mother.

"You're just tryin' to get Vanna away from me, aren't you?" Link said to Zi.

"I'm not lying about it being impossible for more than one person to get through the rest of here. There's no way you can both ride on the spinner together," Zi said.

Link put the spinner on the floor and unbuckled his baldric. Zi asked what he was doing, but Link didn't respond to him. He put his baldric in his pouch before turning his back to Vanna and telling her to get on. The thought of riding around on his back on that thing high off the ground made her heart start racing, but if it came down to heights with him or being stuck with Zi, there would be no question.

Once she was on his back, Link stepped onto the spinner. He teetered some at first trying to get it upright, but he quickly found his balance and figured out how to propel it. It wasn't as scary as Zi's incompetence had made it appear.

"Okay, showoff, I got it," Zi said.

Link hopped off, landing safely on his feet and letting the spinner topple over to the ground, and Vanna got off his back. Zi picked up the NEVAs from where he had left them on the floor and walked over to where the spinner had taken them. His face was stuck in a nervous frown and he was growing fidgety.

"Vanna," he said seriously. "My dad is going to come for you if I don't bring you back myself."

She shrugged and crossed her arms, trying to pretend that she wasn't at all scared. "Let him. I'm not going anywhere."

"He won't be as lenient as I've been. He won't be lenient at all. The second he finds you..."

"I'll have Midna warp me away," she finished.

"He'll never get close enough to her," Link said. "Tell him he might as well give up already."

"Go shove a goat, you hick," Zi snapped. "This is none of your business."

Midna popped up out of Vanna's shadow. "It might not be his business, but it is my business, because Vanna is working for me. Remember what I told you about what'll happen if you try to get in my way?"

"You won't be here forever," Zi said.

"Neither will you if you don't back off," Midna shot back.

Zi sighed and took a step closer to Vanna. "Listen, Vanna, I don't want this to happen, either. I promise, I really don't. I hate that it has to be this way... But it's inevitable, and you know it, so why bother keeping up this stupid game of cat and mouse?"

If he weren't so tall, she would have punched him square in the face. His question, at its core, was 'Why don't you let yourself be murdered?'—and he really had the nerve to ask her that?

"Even if it is inevitable—and it's not—that doesn't mean I have to take it lying down," Vanna said through her teeth.

He looked to his feet and quietly said, "It'd be easier if you did."

"That's enough," Link said. "Ooccoo Jr., warp him as far away from here as you can."

Ooccoo Jr. made an affirmative chirping noise and flew around Zi. Vanna hardly got to see the shock that flashed across his face before he vanished. Link thanked Ooccoo Jr. when he returned, and then he turned to look at Vanna. His features were blurred, but his expression of concern was still clear.

"It doesn't matter how far away he was warped to," she said. It was only as she heard her voice shake that she realized her entire body was shaking with anger, and only as she blinked that she realized she was on the verge of tears from it. "He set the front of the prison as a base on his NEVA. He can get back there instantly. It'd only take a couple more times teleporting by distances for him to get right back here."

"He said he can't teleport by distances in the upcoming rooms, right? Let's go to them. You'll be safe," Link said.

"And if he does manage to get to us anyway," Midna said, "he'll be ashes on the floor before he can make off with you."

"No!" Vanna yelled. Both Midna and Link were startled by her sudden outburst. "You are not killing him. If you want to kill Mr. Rider when he gets here... Fine. But leave Zi out of this."

"There is no leaving Zi out of this. Look at what he's trying to do to you. He's trying to get you killed." Midna floated to her and grabbed her face in her hands. "Get that through your thick skull, Vanna. He's trying to get you killed. Why do you want to protect him?"

"Because he's still my friend," Vanna said softly. She felt her cheeks heat up at the admission. She knew they would think it was stupid of her to still think of him as a friend in spite of everything, but she couldn't help what she felt.

Midna dropped her hands and drifted back, mouth slightly agape. Link stepped to stand where she had been floating.

"Friends don't stalk you or try to kidnap you so someone can murder you," Link said. "You need to let go of the past you two had together. Just 'cause he was your friend once don't mean he still is."

Vanna gulped and let her arms fall to her sides, hands still clenched into fists. Why could no one see that it was complicated? That she couldn't simply decide to not care for him at all anymore? That it was hard to just accept that someone who'd been her best friend for years had turned on her at the snap of his dad's fingers?

"Come on," Link said, moving to her side and putting a hand on her back. "Let's get goin'. We're almost done here."

Her mind was in a haze as they traversed the prison, thinking things through and attempting to disentangle the mess that was her feelings for Zi. Luckily for her, she didn't really have to do anything that would require any of her attention as Link controlled the spinner beneath them. Unluckily for her, her introspection solved just about nothing. Her thoughts went around in circles, and her feelings were still a convoluted mess by the time they neared the boss door and Link let her off his back.

"We made it," he said through a yawn.

"And it seems Zi didn't come back here," Midna said from Vanna's shadow. "Probably got too scared."

"Speakin' of him... If he's right that the battle past here is a one-person job with the spinner, I'd prefer you stay by the door instead of on my back," Link said.

Vanna told him she was okay with that, and then he put the spinner in his pouch for their walk up to the door. In truth, she wasn't all that okay with it—staying away and leaving him to do everything made her feel bad, even though she knew she'd be unhelpful at best and a burden at worst clinging to his back while he rode around.

Like in the Forest Temple and the Goron Mines, the boss door was so big that its lock was unreachable, but Vanna didn't have to climb on Link's shoulders to unlock it. Since she was no longer a mere shadow, Midna was able to grab the key they'd found and fly up to unlock the door for them. Vanna was surprised when Midna assisted them even further by using her hand-hair to push the door open all by herself. It was a strange but welcome change of pace for her to actually be supportive.

The boss was visible almost as soon as they entered the dark and spacious circular room. With the exception of the outer edge, the room was entirely a sand-filled sinkhole, and the arm and head of a colossal skeletal creature were motionless down in the sand. A multitude of swords and spears were embedded into its horned skull. Zi had said it was called Stallord; Vanna figured she should have guessed that the boss of a temple filled with skeletal Stal-monsters would be an enormous skeleton.

Though Stallord's body made no indication that it knew they had entered, deep chuckles echoed throughout the room. In a flash of black squares, someone Vanna had only seen once before appeared on its head—Zant. Midna shot in front of her and Link, hand-hair formed into a giant fist behind her back, while Link retrieved his sword from his pouch.

"You've brought your light world pets with you yet again... How astonishing that your precious divine beast lives at all, nonetheless as a human again. No wonder some call him 'Hero,'" Zant said, spitting his final word out with all the derision he could muster.

Vanna remembered that at their last encounter, he had spoken to Midna in an alien tongue, and that made her realize he was speaking in Hylian this time only so she and Link could understand him.

"But truly, this is a bittersweet reunion..." Zant went on. "For I fear this is the last time we will see your hero alive!"

Zant curled his thin fingers out in front of himself and summoned a glowing red sphere like he previously had in the Light Spirit's cavern. Expecting him to hurl it at them, Vanna positioned herself to take off running. Instead of using it as a projectile, a massive intricate sword materialized from it in his hands. With a grunt, he spun it around and lodged it into Stallord's head. The glowing red lines from the sword transferred to Stallord, running over the surface of its bones.

After Zant turned around, he disappeared the same way he had come. Midna's fist-hair relaxed some, though it stayed twitching like it was ready to ball up again and punch at any second.

The room began to rumble and pinkish orbs illuminated in Stallord's eye sockets. It lifted its head, and the rest of its upper body emerged from where it'd been buried, sending a flurry of sand flying. Stallord bent forward until its face was mere feet from theirs, and with no lungs or larynx, let out a hoarse roar.

Link again voiced his desire for Vanna to stay back as he swapped out his sword for the spinner. She stood by the door, brows together and mouth set in a frown, while he zoomed off on the rails around the sand pit. Now that she knew what he was up against, her inaction made her feel even worse. She had no idea what she could do to help him, though. If all those giant swords in Stallord's head had done nothing to it, she couldn't see how her dinky little arrows could. If only she had bombs that didn't require a fuse to be lit...

Playing nervously with the pendant around her neck, she kept her eyes on him. It was hard to watch, especially when he detached the spinner from the rails and went careening down to where Stallord's spine emerged from the sand. As the spinner smashed against its vertebrae, they cracked and gave out.

Vanna had been fearful that the spinner would have trouble getting back up the incline and Link would get stuck in the whirling sands, but he'd picked up enough speed that it wasn't a problem. What was a problem were the skeletons that raised from the sand. They were all no taller than the average man, decked in rusted armor with rusted swords and shields to boot. They seemed particularly dead for the undead, heads fallen limply to the side and arms hanging uselessly—but though they weren't actively seeking to harm, they created obstacles for Link. He would have to weave through them to get to Stallord.

For her, however, they presented an opportunity to help. With how frail they looked, she was sure that her arrows could knock them down. Midna moved to float at her side while she shot at them. That, too, was another change of pace for Midna. She normally stayed in the shadows during boss battles, not watching and evidently not caring.

With Vanna shooting down the most obtrusive skeletons—the ones that formed lines of defense around Stallord's spine—the battle became almost too easy. If he timed his jump from the rails right, Link could make it to the vertebrae and back safely. Neither the swings of Stallord's arms nor the dark substance it spewed could reach her, and Link moved fast enough to avoid the attacks.

Link soon decimated the final vertebra below where Stallord's ribcage began, and with a final echoing bellow, Stallord fell to its side and the glow in its eyes flickered out. Its body was engulfed by the sand and the remainder of the smaller skeletons sunk with it. Vanna felt ridiculous for having been such a worrywart over what had to be the easiest boss yet.

The sand began to lower like it was draining out of the pit. Link tried to steer the spinner back up to the outer perimeter where Midna and Vanna were, but by the time he made it over, the sand was too far down for him to get up. Vanna jumped down to him before the sand could lower to the point where it was no longer safe to. The sand continued to lower at a brisk pace until it was all drained out and they were on the solid floor at the bottom of the pit.

A hole for the spinner to slot into was in the center of a slightly raised circle, but more noteworthy than that was Stallord's skull, lying lifeless on the ground. The fact that it hadn't exploded away into nothing as was usual with monsters left Vanna on edge. Link didn't seem too bothered by it, though; his eyes were set on the hole. He slowly walked to it with the spinner in hand, but Vanna stayed back with Midna.

"Um, you're not worried about the skull?" Vanna asked.

He shrugged. "Looks dead to me."

"It always looked dead," she said. "That means nothing."

She could guess why Link was apathetic about it—he was too tired to think straight. He was fighting off a yawn as he sluggishly put the spinner into the hole and stepped onto it.

The rotating gears on the spinner made the inner circular platform begin to rise farther up. Vanna hopped onto it, though she hated the idea of being stuck on it with Stallord's skull. She watched it cautiously while Link worked to bring the platform up, only taking her eyes off of it when they were as high as Link could get them. There was an open archway in the outer wall, and it looked like there was supposed to be a bridge to connect it to the platform, but there wasn't.

Midna was looking the same way. "I bet the Mirror of Twilight is past that arch... If our big skeletal friend really is dead after all, we should go. I can use my hair to get you and Link over the gap."

She went ahead and flew over. Vanna turned to ask Link if he really wanted to leave while Stallord was arguably yet undefeated, and she gasped. Link was walking toward her with the spinner in his arms, unaware that Stallord's head was floating behind him with the glow back in its eyes. Everything happened so fast, then—Stallord rushed forward, Vanna bolted to get out of its path and yelled for Link to watch out, and she looked back to see Stallord ram into Link, making him drop the spinner and go flying off the edge.

Link's scream cut off suddenly as he hit the ground below, and a wave of nausea hit Vanna.

Chapter Text

As someone who never got ill, nausea was not something Vanna was familiar with. The only other time she'd ever felt it was when she'd found out what she was.

This time was worse.

Midna darted to Link, and she yelled up, "He's okay!"

The nausea subsided to some degree. Vanna doubted that 'okay' was the right word to use, but she would take it as long as 'okay' meant 'alive.'

She still needed to get down there and see that Link was okay for herself. She barely avoided getting rammed into by Stallord as she hurried to grab the spinner. Not taking the time to think about how she hardly understood how to use it, she pushed the gear against the top of the rail that coiled up and around the platform and jumped onto it. After a few excruciating seconds that felt like hours of trying to figure it out, it took off down the rail.

Going down felt like it took forever, too, though Vanna knew she was going absurdly fast. She didn't dare look back to see, but she knew Stallord was chasing her. She didn't bother to wait for the spinner to bring her all the way down; she was probably ten feet above the ground when she detached it from the rail and leaped off, and she stumbled her way over to Link.

Out of all the words she could have used to describe how he was, 'okay' was not one of them. His face was twisted and body writhing with agony, his breaths were quick and shallow, and his left arm was curled against his stomach with his right hand hovering protectively over his left elbow.

"He had his left elbow back when he hit the ground. He thinks he broke it and some ribs," Midna said hastily.

Link groaned. "I don't think—I know."

Vanna was about to ask him how his head was, but a roar from Stallord cut her off. It was still a ways above them, but it was racing closer every second.

"I need to get Zant's sword out of the skull," Midna said. "It'll keep that thing alive as long as it's still in there. Stay here!"

Telling them to stay wasn't quite necessary, because Link certainly wasn't going anywhere and there wasn't anywhere to go but in a circle regardless. Midna streaked into the air and in front of Stallord, and it stopped where it was. She looked so tiny next to it. Vanna remembered how featherlight Midna had felt in her arms when she'd carried her through Castle Town, and she couldn't imagine her removing the sword.

Midna planted her feet on its head, and though Vanna couldn't see exactly what she was doing with her back being turned to her, she presumed that she was holding and pulling at the sword. Stallord thrashed violently in an attempt to throw her off to no avail. It seemed like she was having no luck dislodging the sword, but at least she was keeping Stallord from attacking.

Vanna looked back at Link as she heard him groan again. He was trying to sit up, and his face had scrunched up even further with pain. She told him he should lay back down, but he just made a disapproving grunt at her and continued sitting up. He kept his left arm close to himself and moved his right arm around to fumble with one of his pouches.

It dawned on her what he was probably reaching for. "Do you want me to get the rest of your blue potion out for you?"

"No, 's no good for broken bones," he panted. "Get bombs."

"Bombs?" she repeated. She said nothing of it, but she thought he had to have a concussion.

He groaned once more, like he was frustrated with her for not immediately understanding why he wanted them. "To shoot at the skull. I'll light 'em for you."

Vanna wasn't sure how effective that would be, though she figured it wouldn't hurt to try. Midna was still struggling.

She got out the bomb bag and attached a bomb to one of the few arrows she had left. After taking aim, she yelled for Midna to move. Midna took cover near the ground once she saw what Vanna was up to. Link used his right hand to light the fuse, and she let the bomb arrow fly.

Thankfully, she managed to hit Stallord on the first try. The blast blew it back and cracked the bone around the sword. Overall, it didn't seem to have done too much damage, but she hoped the cracks would be enough to give Midna an easier time. Midna flew back up, and rather than using her hands as she had done before, she wrapped her hand-hair around the hilt.

With a forceful tug, the sword came out and dissipated into black slices in Midna's grasp. The glow in Stallord's eye sockets instantaneously went out, and it fell from the air. Right as it hit the ground, it exploded into a black cloud of smoke, and then it was gone.

Midna was slow floating back over to them. Vanna didn't feel the relief she normally felt when bosses were killed, and she didn't think Link or Midna did, either. Link had his eyes closed again, and he hung his head. Save for his quick breaths, it was silent for a few moments.

Vanna was the first to break the silence. "...A potion really won't help you?" she gently asked. Though she remembered him telling her that potions couldn't always heal severe injuries, it was hard to believe they were entirely worthless for healing bones.

"Potions can make broken bones heal wrong," he said, voice feeble. "I can't risk it. Not with my left arm."

Midna hummed. "So you'll just have to get the healer of Kakariko Village to cast it... Do you think you can hold off? We're so close to the Mirror of Twilight..."

"I thought the whole point of us looking for the Mirror of Twilight was that it would get us to Zant, so he could be taken down," Vanna said. "There's no way Link can go up against him as hurt as he is."

"Link won't have to fight Zant right away. We'll figure something out once we get to the mirror," Midna said. She flicked her wrist and made one of her portals appear on the ground beneath them. "Go grab the spinner, Vanna. I'll warp us to that archway up there."

Vanna put the bomb bag back in Link's pouch before going to grab the spinner. Its size made it hard to maneuver it around her to get it into her pouch, but she got it in there. Link was still in the process of getting to his feet when she walked back to the portal, and she noticed blood coating the hair on the back of his head. He must have cracked it hard when he fell. His left arm stayed folded over his abdomen, face stayed twisted, and his narrowed eyes were rimmed with red; she'd never seen him look so miserable. She wanted to help him stand the rest of the way up, but she didn't know where she could grab him to offer support without causing him more pain.

When Link had straightened up, Midna warped them. Vanna started to worry about how they would get out of the desert as the pieces of her body reformed under the arch. Midna's own 'short-distance' portals, as she had called them, did not require Link to transform, but the twilight portals all over Hyrule did—what would happen to him if he transformed with broken bones?

Midna was nearly bouncing in the air with impatience while Link limped down the hall and Vanna kept pace with him. They came out the other side on a balcony of sorts that wrapped around the prison. Stars were still in the dark sky, but orange was beginning to form on the horizon.

Eventually, they made it up to the coliseum-like top of the Arbiter's Grounds. In the middle of the sandy atrium was a towering statue of a woman with a snake twirling around her body, and Vanna could faintly make out spinner rails along the snake. Sturdy black chains reached below the sand from the six pillars that stood high into the sky. Though the pillars were impossible to miss even from miles away, it wasn't until now that she saw that the top of one of them was broken in half.

Seeing as Link was in no shape to be doing much of anything, Vanna figured it was on her to ride the spinner to the top of the statue. She started walking toward it while reaching into her pouch. The spinner enlarged as she pulled it out, and unable to hold it with one hand, she dropped it.

As she turned to pick it back up, black spires suddenly slammed into the ground, and glowing red lines connected them. She tried to run through the red lines, but they knocked her back. She was barricaded in, and Link was on the other side.

"What's going on?!" she said.

Vanna heard whooshing sounds from above her, prompting her to look up. In the sky was a large portal like the ones Midna made, but the lines were red. Five grotesque black creatures fell out of the whorls one by one, each landing in heaps and then raising on all fours. Her heart started to race, and her body itched to run, but she knew she had nowhere to go. She was trapped with these nightmare creatures.

"Get your sword out!" Midna said.

She came right over the barriers and floated in front of Vanna, holding her thin arms out to either side as if to protect her. Vanna was puzzled for a second by her demand—she'd been exclusively using her bow and arrows for too long—but she retrieved it and the wooden shield from her pouch when it kicked in. Her sword felt foreign in her hand, too heavy, and she wished she hadn't traded out the metal shield for Link's flimsy wooden one.

Midna thrust her hands toward the nearest monster, and orange arcs shot at it, freezing it in place. Vanna almost felt like she was on autopilot as she rushed to it and began slashing at it. She wasn't sure if time felt like it was flowing differently because of some robot equivalent of an adrenaline rush, but it went down sooner than she'd expected, just in time for Midna to freeze the next one that came running to her. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she recognized that something was off with these monsters—the one she'd 'killed' hadn't exploded away.

The next one didn't explode either, nor did the third. It felt like she'd somewhat come back to her senses after that one was downed, and she had a chance to catch her breath. The two left over were roaming around on the other side of the atrium, paying no mind to her at all, but they were closer together than any of the other three were. She didn't know what she would do if Midna could only freeze one at a time; the other would surely notice her.

"You have to kill those two at the exact same time," Midna said.

Vanna whipped her head around to look at her. "What?"

"If one Shadow Beast is left over, it'll scream to revive the ones who've fallen," she explained. "So the last two always have to be killed at the same time, or else you'll be starting all over at the beginning."

"But you can freeze them both, right?" she asked.

Midna grimaced. "When Zant stole my Fused Shadow, he stole a lot of the power I had with it... I don't think I can hold an energy field over both of them for long. It'd be best for me to do it at the last minute. That way if you kill one a little earlier, I'll have the other one already paralyzed so it can't scream."

Vanna gulped heavily as she looked back at them, and she had to hold back a whine. Taking a few steadying breaths, she assured herself that she could do it, and then she charged at them. She decided to go for her tried-and-fairly-true method of swordfighting—swinging like crazy while hiding behind her shield like a little wimp.

That worked ... for about ten seconds, before one of them punched the shield and it snapped in half. The force of the blow made her stagger backward, and as she struggled to regain her footing, the other beast took a swipe at her. Sizzling, fiery pain erupted in four lines over her right arm, making her scream and drop her sword. Tears pricked at her eyes instantly.

Before either of them could attack again, Midna used her power to stun them. "Hurry! I can't hold them for long, but you've almost got them!"

She tried her best to ignore the pain in her arm as she grabbed her sword from the ground. Each broad swing sent a new wave of burning down the cuts, and the burning invigorated her in turn. Vanna slashed back and forth as fast as she could while ensuring she hit both of them each time.

Midna's arms dropped and her electricity crackled out, and Vanna knew it was over. All of the Shadow Beasts and the spires exploded into paper-thin twilight squares that shot up into the sky. She watched them go up to the portal, which turned black and cyan instead of black and red before vanishing. The stars it had been concealing looked distorted, making it evident that the portal was still there, just mostly invisible.

"That was close," Midna said. "At least now we can use their portal to get back here whenever we want."

Link hobbled over to them. His nearness calmed Vanna, but it was clear he hadn't calmed himself yet. "Are you okay?" he worriedly asked.

Vanna followed his sight down to her arm. Now that she was no longer moving it, the pain was steadily waning. She used her left hand to wipe at her eyes. "I'm okay... I—I guess I was expecting worse, honestly."

"I'd offer to stitch those up for you... But I think my elbow might pop out if I move my arm," he said with a frown.

She sighed, and then mumbled, "Should've made Zi leave the glue with me... And I'm sorry about your shield."

Link attempted to shrug and flinched. "It—it's all right. We can get another."

She looked at Midna as the sight of her arm started to make her uneasy. "Thank you for helping me."

"Yeah, I thought this would be a bad time to let you get killed," she said flippantly. Vanna snorted at her waving off the one genuine thank-you she was ever going to get from her, and a smile lit up Midna's face. "Now take the spinner and go up to the top of that statue! That's probably the last thing that has to be handled before we get the mirror!"

Vanna took one last glance at the rippling stars before going to pick up the spinner where she'd dropped it. The lingering burn in her arm was relieved by the biting wind as she rode up the spiraling snake. At the top of the statue's head, the snake rail ended, and the spinner dropped off right into a gear-shaped hole. She moved her feet back and forth against the pedaling contraptions to keep the spinner moving.

A sudden jolt nearly made her fall over, and then something started happening. The statue began to lower into the sand, and the pillars began to rise. Her feet met more resistance and the pedals got harder and harder to push. The top of a large black slab emerged from the sand, pulled up by the creaking chains attached to the pillars. She watched as it rose, using it for motivation to keep going. With the monolith entirely unearthed, dangling high above the sand, the statue she was on submerged completely and she could move the spinner no more. Out of breath, she stepped off the spinner and put it away, and then she turned around.

Opposite the monolith, a short platform had risen from the sand. A semicircle frame was atop it, and nestled into one side of the frame was a fragment of something dark, chipped around the edges. Midna flew up to it and froze.

Vanna peered at Link inquisitively, and the look on his face told her he was confused as well. They took the short flight of stairs up the platform to Midna. She collapsed on the ground in front of the frame, head in her hands, sobs racking her tiny body. Shock piled on top of the confusion Vanna felt. It had to be a cold day in hell with Midna crying.

But as her eyes were drawn back to the black fragment, she noticed her reflection in it, and it hit her. That was the Mirror of Twilight—a fragment of it. It was broken.

A quiet gasp from beside her made her glance at Link again. She thought he had gasped because he'd come to the same understanding she had, but she realized he was shocked by something else, something high above them. She looked where he was looking, and she gasped, too.

Floating over the five intact pillars were apparitions that radiated ethereal white light. They were of varying sizes, though their masks and flowing robes obscured any other distinguishing features they might have had.

"A dark entity lurks in the twilight, housing an evil power..." The words sounded like they were sung from a choir, with voices that were distinct and somehow blended into a uniform indistinctness at once. "You seek the mirror that will lead you to it."

"Yes," Link responded breathlessly.

"We sages have guarded the Mirror of Twilight since ancient times at the command of the Goddesses... But it has been fragmented by mighty magic. That magic is a dark power that only he possesses... His name is ... Ganondorf."

Vanna was unsure if she was just hearing things, but she could have sworn that Link whispered the name along with the chorus of voices.

They were both silent as the sages recounted the tale of Ganondorf. Some of the story was already familiar to her, particularly the part about the invading band of thieves that tried to gain dominion over the Sacred Realm. The rest was all new to her; how Ganondorf had been the one in charge of the thieves, how he'd been exposed and the sages had brought him here to this very Mirror Chamber to exact their justice upon him, how, 'by some divine prank,' he'd wound up with a piece of the Triforce...

The sages turned dejectedly to the broken sixth pillar as they described how Ganondorf had killed one of their own. They claimed to have banished him to the Twilight Realm following the murder, and from there speculated that he had passed on his evil power to Zant.

"You're just now figuring out where Zant got his power?" Midna said. Though her words themselves were harsh, she spoke them with a softer tone than Vanna had ever assumed was possible to come from her mouth. "It's far too late... Zant already destroyed the mirror."

"It is not too late," the sages said in unison. "Only the true leader of the Twili can utterly destroy the Mirror of Twilight ... so Zant could merely break it into pieces. The fragments now lie hidden across the land of Hyrule."

For the first time, the sages did not speak all at once. A sage with a deep, old voice, said, "One is in the snowy mountain heights..."

"One is in an ancient grove..." came a woman's and child's voice.

"And one is in the heavens..." came another woman's and a man's voice.

"You who have been sent by the Goddesses should be able to gather the three pieces," they all said together. "But you must be prepared, for a dangerous power resides in those fragments..."

One by one, the sages' forms flickered away like embers into the sky. The final one to disappear, the littlest one, lifted a hand and gave a small wave before it went away. Link stared at where that sage had been, a hint of a smile on his lips, while Vanna took a hesitant step toward Midna.

"Are you all right...?" she cautiously asked.

Midna rubbed her eyes before crossing her arms. "I still can't believe... He thwarted us again. All this work to get here for nothing..."

Vanna crouched down next to her. "It wasn't for nothing. Even if the mirror wasn't broken, it's not like it would've been useful to us right now anyway. Link kinda broke his arm, remember?"

"I know..." She huffed. "But the mirror being broke pushes this whole thing back even further than Link breaking his arm. It'll be weeks before Link can properly use his arm again, and then weeks of trying to track down the fragments with only those vague little clues they gave us..."

"I'm sure the fragments won't be that hard to find," Vanna said. Especially since Zi had given her that list of all the temples.

"We'll see," Midna grumbled. She pushed herself off the ground into the air. "I'll go ahead and warp us to Kakariko Village now..."

"Wait," Vanna said, standing up. "I promised Mahana I'd catch up to her with Link at the retreat once the boss was killed... She'll probably think we died if we don't show up soon."

"Well, while you were out of it before, Link killed some Shadow Beasts between the town and the retreat, so there's a new portal close by it. I can warp you two there first," Midna said.

"But, I was gonna say, I'm actually kind of worried about using those portals..."

Vanna didn't have the chance to explain herself before Midna tonelessly said, "You've used them before. They're the safest, fastest way to get around."

"It's not that I think the portals aren't safe, it's that..." She looked back at Link, who was standing there silently, still with his left arm clutched close to himself. "Link has to transform to go through the twilight... What if transforming does damage to him because of his bones?"

Midna said, "Oh," at the same time Link insisted, "I'll be fine."

"Just moving a broken bone normally can do more damage to the bone and the nerves and tissue around it," Vanna said. "Having your entire body transform into a wolf has to shift your bones a lot."

"Now really isn't the time to play all brave, Link," Midna backed her up. "You're already gonna be out of commission for weeks—you don't need to hurt your arm even more."

"Then I'll only transform as little as needed," Link said through a yawn. "Once to get out of here, then I'll stay a wolf 'til we get to Kakariko. Vanna can go to the retreat right quick by herself."

Midna looked at Vanna for her approval, which she reluctantly gave only because the alternative—riding all the way there—would take far too long. She produced the shadow crystal in her hand and flung it at Link. He doubled over, falling to his hands and knees with a cry. His human voice turned into canine yelps as he transformed. The transformation completed swiftly, but his wolf body stayed on the ground whimpering.

Vanna dropped to her knees in front of him and unthinkingly reached out to pet him. She whispered to him that he was okay while gently rubbing him until he stopped whimpering. As he opened his big blue eyes and stared at her with markedly human awareness, she sheepishly drew her hands back. It was too easy to forget that it was really him underneath all that fur and not just some animal.

"Do you feel okay?" she asked.

Link nodded and attempted to stand up. He let out another yelp and nearly fell forward as he put pressure on his front left leg. He balanced himself on three legs instead.

"Stay right where Midna warps us until I get back from the retreat, all right?" she said. "Don't walk around on that leg and hurt it even more."

He nodded again, and then Vanna felt her body break apart into shreds as Midna warped them away.

When they got to Kakariko Village not much later, Midna summoned the shadow crystal from Link's body, transforming him back into a human. He was left on the ground crying out again, body hunched over his left arm. Vanna knelt down beside him, but she kept from petting or cooing at him this time. He took a minute to regain himself, and then reached out to her with his right arm for support to stand up.

"I'll be in the shadows..." Midna said before disappearing beneath their feet.

They walked down the village side by side, with her only leaving him once to check if Renado was in the sanctuary. He wasn't, so they went to the Elde Inn hoping he'd be there.

To their luck, he was, and he was already awake and leisurely pacing the front lobby. His warm brown eyes trailed to them as they stepped in, and his normally peaceful face furrowed.

"What happened?" he asked, his voice staying measured and composed.

Renado walked to them, eyes scanning them from head to toe as he did. They narrowed abruptly, and he stopped in his tracks.

Vanna's heart felt like it could have stopped when she realized what he was looking at. Her arm. She couldn't believe she'd been so preoccupied thinking about Link's injuries that she'd forgotten about her own.

"I'll explain later," she said quickly. She pointed to Link to get his attention off her. "Link fell. From really high. Like, he-should-probably-be-dead high. He broke his arm, and some ribs, and he cracked his head on the ground and he's bleeding."

Renado gestured to a stool at the table he was standing next to. "Please sit down, Link. I will go get all I need to attend to you."

Link and Vanna walked over while Renado headed for the front doors. Renado glanced at her once more as they passed each other by. She felt like she could breathe again only when she heard the door close behind him.

"This is great," she muttered.

Link sat down gently and frowned at her. "It'll be okay," he said, words slightly slurring together.

She sighed and took off her belt, then sat it on the table and took off Link's tunic. As she reached for her pouch on her belt, she noticed that Link's brows were raised and he was eyeing her midriff. She pulled out her long-sleeved cropped shirt from home and put it on over her bandeau top; it was the only long-sleeved thing she had aside from her dress, and she wanted her arm covered in case someone else came into the lobby. She thought she looked stupid wearing a teal shirt with maroon pants, but Link didn't seem to mind the clashing colors. His eyes stayed on her midriff.

"Is my bellybutton that fascinating?" she jokingly asked.

It was hard to tell with his cheeks and ears still being sunburned, but she thought he reddened a touch further. He tore his eyes away and looked at her face. "It's ... an average bellybutton, I guess?"

Vanna breathed out a halfhearted laugh. "I think that concussion's starting to kick in."

"Don't have a concussion."

"Suuure," she drawled as she sat down on a stool next to him. "Today really hasn't been your day, huh? You're still all sunburned, you got thrown off the Bullbo, then attacked by a horde of Bulblins, knocked out by a giant axe-wielding Bulblin, and now this..."

He pursed his lips contemplatively. "...I haven't been wearin' my hat."

"...Yeah?" she said. "Do you have a point, or do you just miss your hat?"

"Point is, none of this probably would've happened if I had my hat on," he said like it was obvious.

"Uh huh," she said, smiling. She wondered if this was how he'd felt when she'd been acting loopy from the heat in the desert. "I'm sure wearing your stup—I mean, charming hat would've prevented all of this."

"Damn right," he murmured.

The room fell into silence. Vanna nervously played with her fingers, going over what she'd say to Renado in her head while they waited for him to get back.

Link perked up a couple of minutes later, ears twitching. "Renado's coming."

Her breath hitched. 'It'll be okay,' she told herself, the voice in her head taking on Link's timbre. As she thought the words, Link repeated them aloud, and he reached over to squeeze her knee with his right hand. She laid her hand over his and looked into his eyes. He gave her an easy smile.

She would tell Renado what she was. If he was disturbed or wary or anything at all—well, it wouldn't really matter in the end what he thought. She trusted that he would never say anything to intentionally upset her and she trusted that he would keep her secret. Renado was too kind. Her fears were unfounded.

With a sigh, Vanna repeated, "It'll be okay," and then one of the front doors opened.

Chapter Text

Renado was calm and mostly quiet as he tended to Link. He had him remove his shirt, offering soothing apologies when the movement caused Link pain, before tenderly feeling the places Link said hurt the most. Even the most delicate brushes of his fingers caused Link to flinch, for which he softly apologized each time. Already, Link's elbow and his back were turning a nasty purple. Renado said that Link's elbow was definitely broken, though thankfully not displaced, and at least four of his ribs were fractured.

Since Link's head was still weeping blood, Renado wanted to take care of that first. He had Vanna hold Link's blood-matted hair out of the way while he cleansed and then stitched the wound. She paid close attention to how he did it in case she'd ever need to stitch Link herself. While he stitched, he rattled off a list of symptoms for Link to respond if he was experiencing or not. He responded yes to most of them, and Renado said he must have a concussion. Vanna couldn't see his face, but she nearly heard his eyes roll at that.

Renado agreed with Link that it would not be wise to take a health potion yet for fear of his arm healing incorrectly, so there was nothing he could do to aid the healing of his ribs. He picked up a clear bottle filled with an icy blue potion and asked Vanna to rub it over Link's back and shoulders, saying it would reduce the pain from his broken ribs and sunburn. He scooped up some of it to apply on Link's arm before handing the bottle to her. Cold seeped through the glass, and the concoction itself was even colder on her fingers.

While Renado worked on splinting his arm, Vanna diligently massaged the potion over Link. He let out sighs when her hands roamed over the most heavily bruised spots, clearly feeling nice on his end. She couldn't help but wonder if he found it intimate, too, or if that was just her being ridiculous.

She finished thoroughly coating his back and shoulders with the potion long before Renado was finished, so she went to clean her hands and then sat back down on a stool to wait. Renado created a sling out of spare strips of cloth when he was finally finished with the splint, and then he gave Link his final prognosis. He would give Link's arm a more rigid cast in several days once some of the swelling went down, and then that would be removed in about a month. After that, if his elbow seemed healed enough, Link could finally take a health potion to speed up the end of the recovery process. Renado guessed that it would likely be at least a month and a half before Link could go back to life as normal.

A month and a half cooped up in this little village, maybe more, after they'd just spent three consecutive weeks here... Frankly, Vanna couldn't say she hated the idea. She knew she'd be irrationally worried about Mr. Rider and Zi finding her in the village, and she somewhat agreed with Midna that Link's injury pushing back Zant's defeat was a letdown ... but it was certainly better than trekking through danger-filled temples. She'd grown to like Kakariko during the time they'd been here.

Renado's even voice calling her name pulled her out of her thoughts. "Vanna... You said you would explain why your arm looks the way it does?"

Link's right hand found her knee again, and she took a calming breath before starting to explain.

"Mr. Rider is real tall, old, has light skin, green eyes, short brown and gray hair, and he's kinda goin' bald," Talo said, listing each item off with a lifted finger.

"Yup," Vanna said, nodding. "You're sure you can remember all that?"

"Pfft! Of course I can! Now what's this Zi guy look like?"

Knowing that Vanna was still nervous about Zi and Mr. Rider coming for her, Link had made the suggestion of asking Talo to watch out for them a few days into their stay. Talo spent a lot of time on the lookout for monsters heading for the village using a spare pair of 'hawkeye' binoculars he'd found in Malo Mart, so if anyone would spot them, it was him. However, a few others had gathered to listen to her descriptions of them when they'd overheard her telling Talo about bad guys potentially coming to town. Link and Vanna were sitting on the steps of the Elde Inn's porch, and Talo, Beth, Ilia, and a Goron were standing on the ground across from them.

"Zi's the same age as me and Link, but he's a lot taller—really tall, like his dad, actually even a little taller than him," Vanna said. "But he doesn't look much like his dad at all otherwise. He's more tan, and he's got dark spiky hair and brown eyes. He's really thin, too."

"Skinny, tall, tan, dark spiky hair, brown eyes," Talo listed. "Got it."

"I think... I think I saw him before!" Beth said. "A boy like that came through town like a month ago when you and Link weren't here."

"It probably was him," Vanna said. "Renado told me he passed through when we were gone."

Beth gasped and clasped her hands in front of her chest. "Really?! He was so cute! How could he be a bad guy?!"

Vanna sighed. Apparently Zi was going to start amassing his own fangirls in Hyrule, too.

"Looks aren't everything, Beth," Link said with gentle authority. "Hasn't your ma ever told you not to judge a book by its cover?"

She humphed and mumbled, "Yes..."

Link patted his leg with his right hand, and Beth's lips curled up as she came over to sit in his lap. Carefully wrapping her arms around his back, she nestled up to him. He could only return her hug with his right arm. Vanna had learned this was a standard procedure for any sort of lectures he gave the kids so they knew there was no hostility.

The Goron—she still wasn't able to tell most of them apart—smiled widely, showcasing his freakishly huge teeth. "I will tell the patrolling Gorons to keep their eyes peeled for these humans."

She smiled back at him and thanked him, and then he walked away. Ilia took a timid step forward.

"Could I talk to you, Vanna?" she asked.

Vanna blinked a few times, glanced at Link, and stood from the stairs with a nod. She and Ilia walked away from the Elde Inn together silently. Vanna wondered what she wanted to say to her. Aside from that one time in Ordon's Spirit's Spring, they'd never spoken in private.

Ilia stopped by the sanctuary and turned to her, brows drawn together with concern. "I noticed you didn't say why those bad guys would come here... Did you think it might scare the children?"

That wasn't what Vanna was expecting. "No, no, that's not it at all. The kids have no reason to be scared of them. I just didn't say why because it's ... kinda a long story."

Ilia tilted her head. "...I've got time. Would you mind telling me why Rider and Zi would come here? I'm curious what they're after."

Vanna took a deep breath. "Me."

"Bad guys want you?" she asked, eyes wide. Vanna nodded, and Ilia asked, "Why?"

She pursed her lips and looked away, contemplating what to tell Ilia without telling too much. Telling Renado the truth about her had gone astonishingly well—he'd asked few questions, promised her he wouldn't tell anyone, and had even stitched and bandaged her arm for her afterward—but she was still hesitant to let her secret spread any further.

"The short of it is, they think I've committed a crime, and they want to kill me because of it," Vanna slowly said. Ilia's eyes widened more, and she quickly added, "But I'm innocent, I swear. The thing they want me to die for—it's really just ... the fact that I was upset about something. That's it. It's not like I did something while I was upset, I was just upset—at something that would've upset anyone. And they think I should've been different, so now they want me dead."

Ilia was silent for a few moments, taking it in.  "...You really think that wouldn't scare the kids? Deranged men being out to kill you all because you dared to have an emotion? That's... That's terrifying."

"I don't see why the kids would be scared... It's not like they're targets or anything. Mr. Rider and Zi are only out for me."

"I understand—but I think that's plenty reason for the kids to be scared," Ilia said with a rueful grin. "They have so much fun with you. If they knew what you were dealing with, they'd be scared for you. Scared of losing you."

"Oh." Vanna hadn't considered that at all, but she could see where Ilia was coming from. The kids had already lost a friend of theirs not too long ago, and though they hadn't known her for long, she'd become one of the few near-constant presences they'd had over the past few weeks. Her death would be yet another change in their already unstable lives.

Ilia's eyes flickered behind her. "Speaking of fun..."

Vanna looked back to see Talo bounding in their direction. He skidded to a stop in front of them, beaming and hopping with anticipation.

"Hey! Do you wanna shoot down some targets?"

It was a cloudy, chilly day outside. Link and Vanna had been back in the village for exactly two weeks. They'd spent most of their days bouncing around from person to person, but today was different; all of them, save the adults, were together at once by the Spirit's Spring. Excited at the prospect of playing in the rain, which normally skipped right over Kakariko to hit the grassy plains beyond it, Luda had orchestrated an outdoor gathering.

Ralis was out floating on his back by the miniature waterfall—he stayed the most on the outskirts of the group, not talking to anybody—while Talo and Malo were skimming pebbles on the water, Beth was attempting to braid Vanna's hair with instructions from Luda while Vanna attempted making tiny braids in the front of Ilia's short hair, and Link watched them with an amused smile. Beth had wanted him to try to learn to braid as well, but he got out of it thanks to his broken arm.

Beth whined, and her fingers harshly raked through Vanna's hair, undoing both of the braids she'd been working on. "Ugh, how'd you get good at this, Luda?"

"Lots of practice," Luda said, grinning. Her grin faltered as she looked down the village. "...I used to have a friend here with long hair like Vanna's."

Vanna didn't want to let the lighthearted mood get dark, so she made a joke that she might not have long hair by the end of the day if Beth knotted it much more. Though it was at her expense, even Beth herself laughed at it. Vanna then said that it wasn't entirely a joke, because she had once actually tangled her friend Maddie's hair so badly while trying to braid it that she'd had to cut it. Everyone laughed more at that, but Vanna only laughed for a few seconds before she got caught up thinking about Maddie and how strange her resemblance to Ilia was.

"Vanna...?" Ilia said. One of her hands flew up to feel her hair. "Oh, please tell me you didn't mess up my hair that bad!"

"Huh?" Vanna said, blinking. "What? I—no, I didn't mess up your hair. I mean, it looks awful, but you don't have to cut it."

Ilia sighed in relief and let her hands fall back to her lap. "Then what was that look for?"

Vanna began to carefully undo the thin braids she'd put in. "It was nothing, really... I was just thinking—you look a lot like my friend that I was talking about. It's crazy how similar you two are."

"Ah," Ilia said. "Do we act similar, too, or do we only look alike?"

"Maddie was one of my closest girl friends before I came here, but... She actually annoyed me a lot." Her next sentence almost pained her to admit. "Honestly, I like you more than her."

"Well, thanks," Ilia giggled. "I'm glad I'm not annoying."

"Sure you're not," Link said, smiling devilishly.

Ilia playfully jabbed at his leg. "You're the annoying one! I may not remember for myself what you used to be like, but you should've heard the things my father had to say about you when he was trying to help me remember everything. Do you remember when we were little and you used to push me into the lake?"

"Hmm..." Link rubbed his chin, pretending to think about it. "...Nah, your old man probably made that up."

"You know what?" Ilia said. She moved back, still smiling, and motioned for Link to take her spot. "Why don't you let Vanna braid your hair? You've got those nice long strands framing your face just begging to be messed up."

Just then, Vanna felt a raindrop hit her face. She was about to announce that it had started raining—Link had asked them to say if they felt any rain so he could go inside to not get his cast wet—but he must have felt a raindrop fall, too, because he stood up before she could say anything.

"Sorry, no can do; rain's starting," he said, smug. "I'll be in the sanctuary. Y'all have fun."

"I'm coming with you," Vanna said, standing up. "I don't wanna get all cold and wet."

Beth pouted and clasped her hands together. "But... If you go inside, whose hair am I supposed to braid? I'm not good enough yet to braid short hair..."

Vanna knew that was only a cover-up—the real reason Beth didn't want her to go inside was that she, too, had her own little crush on Link, and she would always get jealous when they'd spend time together alone—but she ruffled Beth's hair and played along anyway. "My hair will still be here later for you to braid. Go play in the rain while you have the chance."

With the rain starting to come down harder, Link and Vanna half-ran to the sanctuary. Renado was inside reading a book, and he raised a hand in a silent greeting. Vanna sat down by the fire he had going to warm up, but Link opted to grab some blankets and go sit on a bench by a window.

They were comfortably quiet for a long while. Renado finished his book and went down into the cellar, and after a few minutes of them being alone in the main room, Vanna got up and went to sit by Link on the bench. While an overhang prevented rain from coming through the window, there was no glass to keep the cold out. Having just been sitting by the fire, the cold was a shock, making her shiver. Link noticed and offered her one of the blankets he had, and then he looked back out the window, forehead creased. He was watching the kids and Ilia playing and jumping around by the spring.

"You okay?" she asked.

"Just ... thinking," he said, shrugging.

"...About what?"

A corner of his lips turned down. "...Colin," he quietly said. "...And Rutela."

She slowly nodded and looked at her lap, not knowing what to say. It was nearing two months since Colin had died—and that was the first time she'd heard Link speak his name since. He also hadn't said anything about Rutela since the night he'd revealed that beasts had killed her, and in a way, she was almost more astounded that he'd brought her up than Colin. She completely understood Colin being on his mind, but he hadn't even met Rutela until she was already a ghost. She supposed Ralis' continuing depression was weighing down on him.

An image of Colin's ghost flitted through her mind. Vanna had never told a soul about that night he had appeared to her, that night he'd made her promise to stay with Link and take care of him, like he'd known how hard things would be on Link. Back then, she'd had no intentions of carrying through, believing she'd be going home soon and never seeing Link again... It was almost ironic how she'd been unthinkingly fulfilling her promise.

Link looked away from the window. "I'll ... stop wallowing."

"You don't have to feel bad for grieving, Link," she said, frowning. "You're only human."

"But he wouldn't want it." He huffed, and then his expression lightened into a small smile. "Also, I think I'm a li'l more than human."

She smiled back and rolled her eyes. "Okay, you're only a Hylian who sometimes isn't a Hylian. Is that better?"

"Much," he said, smile broadening.

It went quiet again, and he looked her over. She hoped that her cheeks didn't physically turn red when she felt the sensation of them tingling.

"I like your hair in the middle," he finally said.

It took her a second to come back to her senses and realize what he was talking about. Luda had parted her hair in the middle, saying that Beth would have an easier time giving her even double braids if she worked with the same amount of hair on either side of her head. She'd forgotten to flip it back over to its normal part on her left side. A tiny piece of her considered keeping it in the middle from now on, but she acknowledged how stupid it would be to change her hair in a sad attempt to please someone.

...She'd fix it later.

"Speaking of hair," she said, "how would you feel about me trying to braid yours like Ilia suggested?"

He feigned an annoyed sigh as he scooted closer to her. "Fine... As long as I still have my sideburns by tonight."

Hanging out around Kakariko and entertaining the kids there could be fun, but it could also sometimes be a little tiresome and monotonous. Vanna wanted a getaway from everything, including Link—though she didn't tire of his company, she still needed a life away from him if she was going to be staying in Hyrule—so she had Midna warp her out to the desert to visit Mahana.

When she'd dropped by after she and Link had made it out of the Arbiter's Grounds, she'd only let Mahana know that they were both alive before she'd left in a hurry to get Link to Kakariko. Basically the first thing out of Mahana's mouth when Vanna came back to visit was a request for a rundown of what exactly had transpired in the prison after she and Kira had left. Vanna was halfway through her rundown when Kira came in, saw her on the couch, and then she had to start over from the beginning.

The hours flew by as the three of them lounged around talking. Vanna found that she tolerated Kira a lot better when Link or Zi weren't around to make her unleash her boy-craziness. Still, when Mahana offered to give her a tour of both the retreat and the town, she was okay with Kira staying back and letting the two of them go on their own.

There was one thing in particular that she was itching to see the entire time Mahana was leading her around: the Ancient Robots. She did love seeing everything the retreat had to offer, but she felt a twinge of dejection every time Mahana opened a door that didn't lead to them. She almost started to believe she'd had a heat-induced hallucination of Mahana telling her they had robot remains in the retreat.

"This is where we Gerudo keep the most precious items we stole during our days of being thieves," Mahana said as she brought her into a long hall. "When we renounced our ways, we did try to return some things to their rightful owners... But some items had been in our possession for so long that nobody knew who to return them to, so we kept them."

It was like a museum, with priceless-looking artifacts sitting atop pedestals and exquisite paintings hanging on the walls. Jewels and gems glinted brightly in the firelight from the sconces, begging to be looked at, but Vanna's eyes were immediately drawn to something inelegant and rough in the back corner.

Being careful not to knock over anything on her way, she went straight to it. Dirt and rust seemed to be permanently embedded into its surface, its paint was dulled, and large pieces of it had been chipped off. If she hadn't known any better, she never would have guessed it was supposed to be a robot.

"I knew you would come right to this little guy," Mahana said with a laugh as she came up beside her. "It doesn't look like much, but this is the best-preserved robot we have."

"Does he have a name?" Vanna asked.

"As far as I know, they never had names. They only had numbers to distinguish them. You said you know someone who could revive them, didn't you...?"

"I know someone who could, if he was here and he wanted to, but..."

Before Vanna had come to Hyrule, she'd aspired to work on inventions beyond just testing them out for Mr. Rider—to build and create, maybe even do all the math and calculations that others dreaded doing. She'd thought those aspirations had become unachievable the second she'd become stuck in a world that didn't have some of the most basic technology her world had...

The existence of these robots reignited her ambitions. Maybe she couldn't ever grow up and have the domestic human life she longed for, but at least she had one dream that her circumstances couldn't take away from her.

"I'll do it," she said. "I'll revive them myself."

"...I suppose if anyone would know how to revive a robot, it would be a robot," Mahana said.

Working at a company where robots were one of the main productions, it was only natural that Vanna learned a lot about what went into repairing them. Although these robots were so different from the ones she was familiar with, the base of knowledge she had would have to be a good enough starting point.

"I don't know how to do it, but I'll figure it out. Someday." Vanna sighed and leaned close to the robot, face-to-face. "I'll come back for you, okay?"

She reached out to tap him on his metallic nose, only to draw her finger back when it shocked her.

As intimidating as the residents of Gerudo Town could look, they actually tended to be quite easy-going. Especially when they were drunk out of their minds. Vanna had been disappointed when she'd first discovered alcohol had no effect on her—not because she'd particularly wanted to get drunk, but because it was one more thing that set her apart from humanity—but her mood had soon brightened by the uproar of laughter from the Gerudo finding hilarity and awe in someone her size having such a high alcohol tolerance. She'd ended up spending the night there, and she'd gone back several more times over the following few weeks.

In Kakariko, Link had finally gotten his cast off, and when she was in the village with him, they'd spent a lot of time sparring with wooden swords. It had helped him regain strength and get rid of the stiffness in his arm, and helped her begin to get over her aversion to using swords. Link had won every time, but she'd never minded. It was hard to feel anything but impressed by his swordsmanship.

It was December 1st before she knew it—she'd officially been in Hyrule for three whole months. With the help of his exercises and potions, Link's broken bones were all healed, and they'd decided to get back on the road the following morning. In preparation, they'd gotten potions, a new shield, and the hawkeye from Malo Mart, along with custom bomb arrows from Barnes' Bomb Shop that would explode on impact without requiring a fuse to be lit, all using the money Zi had given Vanna—Link's eyes had looked like they could have popped out when he saw how much money there was, and she'd felt kind of guilty using it because she'd figured that Zi had acquired it in less than lawful means. Hearing that they were going to Snowpeak, Renado had insisted they take all the warm clothes they'd need from the wardrobes of people who had once lived in Kakariko. When they'd entered a vacant house to get them, Link had said he wouldn't need warm clothes because he had a 'built-in fur coat,' but she'd made him take some anyway.

The Ordonian kids, Luda, Ilia, and Link and Vanna had gone just outside of Kakariko into Hyrule Field in the evening to spend some time together. The kids wanted to go play in the snow coating the field even farther out, but the prowling monsters out there made it too dangerous. Vanna's distaste for the cold made her secretly grateful for the monsters out there keeping them closer to the village; she wanted the last of her time away from snowy mountains to be as snowless as possible.

Being that it was practically winter, the sun started to set early, and the temperature dropped with it. Link and Vanna were okay with their borrowed clothes, but the others didn't have proper attire for the cold, so they decided to head back to the Elde Inn. In case they wouldn't see Vanna and Link again before they left, they gave them hugs and goodbyes. Malo was the only one to forego the hugs, and Ilia was the last one to hug Link before they left. She let her arms linger around him longer than the rest of them did. It set Vanna's mind going.

Vanna waited until they were well out of earshot to start talking. "So... There's something I've been meaning to ask you for a while..."

Link rested back on his elbows. "What is it?"

She rested back as well. "Um... Each time I've gone back to the desert, Kira has talked about you... And I wanted to ask..." She gulped and looked at the sunset instead of him. "How did you feel about her kissing you?"

He was quiet for a moment, and then he chuckled. "Well, I wasn't upset about it." He sighed. "You probably wouldn't get it, but when you're from a tiny village like I am, it's like your life is laid out for you. You don't get much of a choice when there's not much to choose from. It was ... nice, to learn that I have options."

That reminded her of the argument they'd had around when they'd gone to the Goron Mines—it already felt so long ago, now—about destiny. He had said he couldn't simply go home even if he wanted to, because a Light Spirit had relayed to him that it was his destiny as the Hero Chosen by the Goddesses to save Hyrule. She had rudely disagreed, saying there was no such thing as Light Spirits or Goddesses or even destiny. She believed in Light Spirits now that she had seen one with her own eyes; she even believed in Goddesses, to the dismay of her bygone vehemently atheistic self, now that she knew spirits and souls and the afterlife existed; but she still couldn't make herself believe that destiny was real.

So, she was surprised to hear that Link also didn't seem to believe his entire life was ruled by destiny when she'd assumed otherwise. Even if only in the romance department, he fully recognized that he had choices in his life.

"...I'm sorry," she said.

"For what?"

Vanna sighed and lay back completely, folding her arms behind her head. "For making so many assumptions and being rude to you about them before. When I first got here, I was just ... angry, and scared, and so confused by this world, but none of those things are excuses. I shouldn't have taken anything out on you. And I'm sorry for not apologizing earlier."

She closed her eyes, beginning to think that she should have let the past stay in the past.

"I forgive you," he said. "But you should know—I never stayed mad at you. I knew you were only the way you were 'cause you were overwhelmed and homesick."

He was looking down at her with a slight smile when she opened her eyes back up. "You... You really weren't mad?" she asked.

"Not after a while. I understood what you were going through," he said. He lay back like her. "So, did Kira ask you to ask me how I felt about her kissing me...?"

Vanna considered lying because the truth would be a bit embarrassing to admit, but she admitted it anyway. "No, I was just curious."

He said nothing for a few seconds. "...I'm curious, too. Have you ever ... kissed someone?"

Her heart sped up, though she tried her best to keep her wishful thinking to a minimum. "Yeah. I'd been in two relationships before coming here. I guess that might seem like a lot to you, since you're from a village with three teenagers total, but that's not really a lot of relationships where I come from. Most people at my school would have a new boyfriend or girlfriend practically every other week."

Link hummed. "Why did your relationships end?"

"My mom," she grumbled. "When I was dating someone, we were only ever allowed to hang out together at my house while my mom was home. The first person I ever dated, Camrin, just ... got tired of never getting to really be alone with me. And then the second one, Renzo... His parents were really overprotective too, so when he moved away, we both decided to break up because we knew we'd never get to see each other."

Though she had moved on from both of them, being reminded of why they'd broken up upset her anew. She remembered being so resentful of her mom for ruining her relationships—and now Daina was no longer around her to do so, and instead Vanna had to deal with the mere fact of her not being a human snuffing out any opportunities she might have otherwise had. She'd gone from one hindrance to another.

"...Do you miss them that much?" Link asked.

"No. I haven't even thought of either of them in months." About three months.

Vanna turned her head to him when he didn't respond, and she saw that he had already been looking at her. He must have seen on her face that she was upset and come to the wrong conclusion.

For the first time, she was hit with an overwhelming urge to just tell him. She wanted to tell him that this past month and a half with him had cemented everything she felt for him. She wanted to tell him how she'd never felt as strongly for anyone else before, not even Camrin or Renzo; how safe he made her feel; how warm his smile made her; how her heart raced when he reached out for her; how good it was to have someone who accepted her for who she was unconditionally.

But they were leaving together in the morning, and she knew now was not the time to make things awkward.

"It's getting dark," she said abruptly, sitting up. "We should probably go inside, now."

"Actually, I wanted to go to the hot spring. One last chance to be warm before we hit the snow." He hopped to his feet and held a hand out to her. "Wanna come with?"

She put her hand in his and stood up, a smile already forming on her face when she agreed. As they started walking back to the village, her heart was very aware that he didn't let go of her hand.

Chapter Text

Link and Vanna decided on taking two stops before heading for Snowpeak, the first of which brought them to a place that was the direct opposite of their ultimate destination: the desert. In their haste to save the Gerudo girls from the Bulblin encampment, they had skipped up the Hero's Shade who was waiting there. Link wanted to learn another sword skill from the Shade before setting off to find the mirror shards, and Vanna wanted to learn more about everything spiritual from him.

In the morning, they tracked him down and found him hidden in an alcove along the path to the Arbiter's Grounds. As he had done before, he split into two separate forms and lunged at each of them. The scenery before Vanna faded from desert to snow, and the Hero's Shade transformed into his undead self.

"It's good to see you again," she said.

He nodded. "I notice that you are now carrying both bow and sword on you. Have you returned to sword training?"

"Yeah. I've been training with Link a lot over the past few weeks, so, uh, I'm not really interested in doing more training with you today." More getting her ass kicked, really. "I kinda just wanna talk to you, if that's all right?"

"By that, I assume you mean you would like to ask me questions."

"Yeah."

"You may ask what you want, but know there are questions I either will not or cannot answer."

"I figured that after you basically kicked me out so you wouldn't have to explain what you meant about regrets last time," she said. She plopped herself on the ground, satisfied that the snow in her subconscious wasn't cold, and she waited until he finished sitting down across from her to go on. "...So. My mom said she thinks I have someone else's spirit, and for a while I thought it was just some crazy quasi-religious belief... But now that I know souls do go from person to person, I'm wondering if there's a chance she was right, but she just used the wrong terminology because most people in my world don't think there's a difference between soul and spirit."

He nodded. "You very well may have inherited someone else's soul, but there is also a chance you are a new soul."

She waited for him to say more, but he didn't. "...I was hoping you could see if she was right since you were able to see that I have a soul and no spirit..."

"I am sorry to disappoint you, but my being a spirit does not mean I am omniscient of all spiritual matters. All I know of your soul is that it exists. Only you can tell if your soul has lived before. Often, people will regain memories from past lives in dreams..."

"...But I don't dream," she said.

"That does not preclude you from regaining memories of past lives; dreams are not the only avenue through which this is possible. You may occasionally be overcome by the feeling that you have experienced present events before, when your path mirrors the path of a past life."

Déjà vu—that wasn't something she'd ever felt. "The girl my mom thinks I'm reincarnated from died as a young child, so if she's right, could that explain why I've never remembered anything from her life? Because she was so young, and I haven't experienced anything mirroring what her life was like...?"

"Perhaps. However, you could also be a new soul as I previously suggested, or simply a young one. New souls have no past lives to remember, and young souls with minimal past lives do not recall them as often as those who have had many past lives."

Vanna sighed, contemplating what to ask him next since this was going nowhere.

If he couldn't answer questions about her, then maybe he'd be open to answering things she'd been wondering about him that hopefully weren't too personal for his tastes. "...Why do you look all decayed? I saw the spirit of a little boy, and he looked the same as he did when he was alive, just more see-through and blue and glowy. Is it because you've been dead for a long time?"

"No, though I have been dead for a very long time. Spirits can appear however we wish, hence the golden wolf form I take on despite never having been such a thing in life. It is a personal choice of mine to project myself as I do. If I were to retain the appearance I had in life ... Link would have many questions. He does not need to know who I am for now. My goal is to teach him."

"Why would Link have questions if he saw what you looked like? Would I have questions?"

"You always have questions." Well, that was the first time she'd ever heard him say anything resembling a joke.

He wasn't wrong, though. "But would I?"

"No, you would not, because I already told you who I am. You would not be surprised to see how similar Link looks to me."

"You seriously haven't told him you're his ancestor?" she asked, brows raised.

"No, and it would be much appreciated if you would allow me to be the one to tell him one day."

"Okay, I'll keep your secret." She smiled. "If, you show me what you looked like. I'll be the judge of how much Link took after you."

"...Not today."

She pouted at him, but he didn't budge. "...Fine, then. But if you won't let me see your real face, will you at least tell me your real name? I really doubt your mom looked at you as a baby and decided to name you 'The Hero's Shade.'"

"I will someday." He stood in a swift movement. "Link has learned his new skill quickly. We are nearly finished."

Vanna groaned. "Why do you have to keep kicking me out right when I ask you something just the tiniest bit personal? It's not fair. You already know so much about me, but you won't even tell me your name."

He ignored that. "Continue to train until we meet again. Next time, I would like you to show me all that you have learned. Goodbye."

Her vision faded away, and she was back in the desert next to Link and Midna when it returned. The golden wolf was gone.

With nothing left to do there, Midna warped them close to Castle Town. Link wanted to go to the group at Telma's bar and look over Snowpeak on their map. He said there were some twilight portals to the north that were close by it, but he thought it best to get a lay of the land so they wouldn't end up aimlessly wandering in the cold snow. As someone who liked neither the cold nor the snow, Vanna had no objections to that.

It was still fairly early in the morning, so not many people were in the streets. The lack of people made it easier for Vanna to notice certain things she hadn't seen in the bustle from before, namely the signs of some businesses. One, in particular, caught her eye—the Fortune-Telling Mansion, Fanadi's Palace. She recalled Mahana telling Zi to see if the fortuneteller in Castle Town would mentor him, and she supposed this was her.

Thinking of Zi made her slow her pace. He hadn't come to Kakariko over the month and a half she'd been there, but he still had to be out there somewhere looking for her. She was bound to run into him sooner or later... And she knew she would feel a lot better if she knew when to expect it. A fortuneteller could give her a heads-up.

She stopped when they got in front of the door and tapped Link on the arm to get his attention. "Hey, I wanna go in here real quick. You can go ahead to the bar. I'll meet you there, or you can meet me outside here if you get done in there first."

Link gave her a questioning look that told her he'd want an explanation later, but he agreed to her plan and went off toward the bar without her.

Vanna raised her fist to knock on the door, but a voice from inside told her to enter before she got to. Startled, she looked over the door and around it for some sort of peephole Fanadi could have used to see her. There was nothing as far as she could tell, not even a window. She warily pushed the door open enough to peek inside.

It was ominous, to say the least. Dark, ornate drapes hung over the walls, and the only source of light was a glowing crystal ball on a small round table. The plump woman sitting behind it had piercing red eyes and a small grin on her made-up face. Her jewelry jingled as she raised a hand to beckon Vanna in.

"I've been waiting for you," the woman said, low voice dragging out and emphasizing every other word.

'What a fortuneteller-like thing to say,' was what Vanna would have responded had she not been speechless.

She slowly stepped inside. The air suddenly felt heavy as she closed the door behind her.

"Come closer," Fanadi said, and Vanna did. "Only I can tell what the fates have in store for you... For ten Rupees."

Mahana had said she was a 'competent' fortuneteller, but Vanna was hesitant to believe that. Though she knew magic and the supernatural were real in Hyrule, the existence of those things didn't automatically give Fanadi any credibility. Every world probably had con artists.

"Before I pay you," she said, "I want you to prove to me that you're the real deal. What's my name?"

Fanadi shook her head. "That is not how this works... My magic ball does not speak to me; it shows me scenes from the future."

Vanna crossed her arms. "Okay, then... Can it show you something that would prove I can trust you?"

She hummed and hovered her hands over the crystal ball, and it glowed brighter. "I see... Yes, you should trust me when I tell you I see him. Thin as a twig... He's tall—yes, very tall, this dark-haired boy you know..."

Those descriptors were enough to get the image through to her and make her tense up. Maybe he really had talked to Fanadi as Mahana had suggested, and he had told her of Vanna... Or maybe she had seen him around town, but what were the chances that Fanadi could have guessed he was in any way connected to her?

"I do not know this boy," Fanadi went on as if she'd read her mind, "but I can see that your fates are heavily entwined. For ten Rupees, you can hear how..."

Even if it turned out to be a con, she could afford to lose a meager ten Rupees. She grabbed a yellow Rupee from the money bag Zi had given to her and placed it on her table. Fanadi smiled and hummed.

"I see... You, fearful. But this boy... He is purer than he seems."

What little trust Vanna had just built up in the woman started to chip away at that. Last time she checked, being an accessory to a planned murder was far from pure.

"Hesitant. Heartbroken. He does not want this..."

Vanna frowned. Why was she trying to make her pity him?

As much as she hated it, she couldn't deny that it was working...

Fanadi gasped, and her eyes widened. The light from her crystal ball dimmed, leaving only her face and hands illuminated and sending the rest of the room into darkness. "They are coming. Son and father. Soon."

Her heart started to race. She leaned in closer to Fanadi and looked into her ball, but she saw nothing. "What? When? What's gonna happen?"

"Death is on the table... But the answer is with you." Fanadi slowly lifted her head, and as her wide, horrified eyes bore into hers, she whispered, "Fly away."

Vanna had never run as fast as she did to get out of there.

"What was that?" Link asked as they exited Castle Town.

He was referring to Vanna bursting into the bar, 'looking like she'd seen a ghost' in Telma's words. She had insisted it was nothing, but she hadn't fooled anyone.

"The fortuneteller told me that Zi and Mr. Rider are coming for me," she said.

"...That's it?" he said. "We both already knew that."

"But she said it was happening soon. And she made it seem like—like..." She gulped. "Like I'm gonna die if I don't do something right. But I don't know what I have to do right."

Link stopped walking and looked at her, brows pulled together. "What did she say? Word for word."

"'Death is on the table, but the answer is with you.' And then she told me to fly away, and I ran out."

"'Death is on the table'?" Link repeated. "As in, your death can be discussed? You can talk them out of it?"

"I don't know, maybe? But then what would 'the answer is with you' mean? What answer? Something specific I have to say...?"

Midna came up out of her shadow. "Guys. There's no reason to analyze some vague drivel like that. Whatever scenario that lady was seeing—if she was really seeing one at all—will never happen. I can warp us all away the second I see Zi or his dad."

"You don't see anything from the shadows, and you stay in them most of the time," Vanna said.

She rolled her eyes. "Then just yell for me to warp you if you see them. No need for more angst." The finality in her voice told Vanna there was no point in discussing the situation with her any further. Midna turned her attention to Link. "So, I only heard what little was said after Vanna made it to the bar. Did you find out anything helpful?"

"Ashei is in Snowpeak visiting her hometown, and we can talk to her and see if she's heard anything about the mirror shard. There's a long tunnel carved through the cliffs around Zora's Domain that should lead us right to it, so we don't have to go climb and hike over Snowpeak's mountains to get there."

"And there's already a twilight portal in Zora's Domain, so we can be there in no time. Shall we?" Midna said.

"We oughta use the portal in Upper Zora's River," Link said. "We'd have to walk some to get to the domain, but I think that'd be better than warping directly into the water in the throne room. We don't need to be all wet when we're headed for the cold."

"Hmm, I guess you have a point. And it'd probably scare the Zoras in there if a wolf and a girl suddenly splashed into their pool... Okay. Let's go."

Midna warped them as soon as Link's transformation into his wolf form was complete. Before her vision even returned, Vanna could tell they were closer to Snowpeak by the sudden drop in temperature. She deflated when she saw that they were already in a snow-covered valley. She'd been hoping they wouldn't come across any until getting out on the other side of the tunnel in Snowpeak itself, but she supposed she should have expected snow to be just about anywhere considering it was December.

Nestled against one of the valley walls above the river was a shack, and a woman was sitting on its porch with her head turned away from them. Midna noticed her as well, and she hurried to take the shadow crystal out of Link and dip into Vanna's shadow before the woman could look their way.

"Zora's Domain is through there," Link said, indicating to a wide and dark cavern.

Hearing Link's voice, the woman's head turned. Vanna narrowed her eyes to get a better look at her, but she didn't have to for long because she got up and started jogging to them. When she got close enough that she could clearly see her face, Vanna's eyes widened.

She looked remarkably similar to Vanna's oldest half-sister's fiancée, Ami. Were she not the third person she'd come across in Hyrule who closely resembled someone she knew from America, she might not have thought much of them looking alike, but it was getting weird. First it was Ilia looking like her friend Maddie, then Shad that looked like her friend Bax, and now there was this woman.

"Hey! Er, sorry to bother you. My name's Iza. I used to rent boats for rides down the river, but the river was dammed up by a rockfall. It's hard enough to run my business in these months as is, and now I can't at all. I've been looking for a handy guy to help out... Do you know somebody who could?" She couldn't have made it more clear that she was really asking if Link would; she didn't look at Vanna while speaking.

"We're kinda busy now, but maybe she can someday," Link said, pointing at Vanna. "She could break up the rocks with bomb arrows."

"Oh... Okay. Sure, if she'd want to," Iza said with a forced smile.

"I'll see about coming back soon," Vanna said.

"You're a lifesaver!" she said to Link. Vanna huffed—she was the one going to deal with her problem, not him. "Be sure to stop on by with her when she comes. I'll be waiting!"

Iza waved—again, only to Link—before turning and going back to her shop. Vanna scrunched up her nose at her, and then she and Link started walking toward Zora's Domain.

"...Do you think she wanted me to help her out instead?" he muttered sarcastically.

"Don't know where you got that impression," she said with a sigh. "I'm surprised she's interested in you, but I guess I shouldn't be."

Link looked taken aback. "What makes you say that?"

"Remember me telling you about my family?" she asked. He nodded. "Seriously, if her hair was smaller, her eyes were darker, and her nose was wider, she'd basically look just like Ami."

He raised an eyebrow and glanced back at her. "Ami's engaged to your sister Kalina, right?"

"Yeah. So, she can't really be that similar to Ami if she likes you... It's just really strange seeing someone who looks so much like her acting a way that she never would." She paused for a moment. "I know you know about Ilia looking like Maddie, but ... I don't think I ever told you about Shad looking like another one of my friends. It seems like every place in Hyrule has at least one person that matches up with someone from my world."

"Even Death Mountain?" he joked.

She laughed. "Except there, and the Gerudo Desert. And I haven't been to Zora's Domain yet, but from what I've seen of the Zoras, I'm confident that no Zora looks like anyone from America, either."

"It could just be a coincidence that some humans here look like humans from there. There are really only so many ways a human face can look."

"Maybe..."

They were silent for the rest of their walk. Nearing the brightened end of the cavern, they were greeted by the sound of waterfalls. Walking into the domain, Vanna's first thought was that it was simultaneously more grand and more simplistic than she had imagined. Murals were carved into the high cliff faces, and multiple waterfalls gushed from above them down into the basin of pure water. While the carvings and the waterfalls were beautiful, especially the largest waterfall at the end, there wasn't too much else to look at at first. Still, the sight was a treat after having gotten so used to the derelict, arid Kakariko.

The cliffs around the domain hugged in, forcing them to walk closer to where the water encroached the land. Looking into its depths, Vanna realized that the basin had to hold more of the domain than the above-ground portion did. Zoras were swimming in and out of numerous holes along its sides. If she had nothing else to do—and if the water weren't cold, as she knew it had to be—she'd have liked to have swum into them to see what all was down there.

Some Zoras standing around eyed them as they passed by, but none of them said anything until they got to the tunnel. A nearby Zora asked them if they knew where they were going, recognizing that Link and Vanna weren't people who regularly used the shortcut to and from Tabantha Village, and then warned them that Snowpeak was currently even colder than usual. After they entered the tunnel, the Zora called out one final warning: "Don't freeze to death!"

For a while, the tunnel was actually warmer than it had been in the domain, but it gradually became colder. About ten minutes into walking, there was still no end in sight, and they stopped to layer up.

Another ten minutes passed before Vanna knew they were almost at the end. The temperature had dropped even further, there were icicles hanging from the roof, and a distant white light appeared that made the glow of her necklace begin to dim. Frigid air carrying snow flurries blew in, and she pulled her hat down her forehead and tried to hide the lower half of her face under the scarf she had on.

It took a few seconds for her eyes to adjust to the whiteness as they stepped out of the tunnel, and everything was still mostly white after they did. Two people with brown faces and colorful clothes were the only things to break the otherwise monochromatic scenery, but even they were hard to make out because of the shroud of falling snow. They were down a slope and across a cracked frozen lake, standing still on a flat plane amid surrounding cliffs.

"H-how are they just standing there in this weather?!" she said, voice muffled from her scarf.

"Probably used to it if they live here." When his sentence was out in a puff of white air, Link could no longer keep his teeth from chattering. "A-and they can probably help us find Ashei..."

Tucking her gloved hands between her arms and her sides, she went with him down the slope. They stopped at the edge of the frozen lake. There was no way around it with the tall cliffs to the right and left of it; they'd have to go from sheet to sheet of ice atop it to get to the other side, being careful to not misstep and fall into the water.

A man's voice yelled over, but with the wind and her ears being covered by her hat, Vanna couldn't hear the words he said.

"You wanna go first?" Link asked.

"W-what?" she said.

"He said we should go one at a t-time so we don't tip or break the ice. I think you should go first since you weigh less, but I-I'll go first if you want me to."

"N-no, I'll go."

Vanna took a moment to build up some courage, and then she slowly placed one foot over to the first sheet of ice. It felt sturdy enough, so she brought her other foot over. She was exceedingly cautious as she stepped from sheet to sheet, always testing her weight before crossing and sometimes backing out and choosing to step to a different piece. As she got closer to the people, she could make them out more—they were young men, definitely related, and they had rods out and were fishing through the gaps in the frozen lake. The lake wasn't very wide, but it took several minutes for her to make it over to them.

One of the men, slightly taller than the other and with long black hair hanging out of the front of his fuzzy hood, spoke to her. "Hello, there. You got business here?"

"We c-came to see Ashei," she said.

The other man looked over, curiosity in his dark eyes. "You know Ashei?"

"She's our cousin," the long-haired man said.

"Really?" she asked. She never would have guessed they were related to Ashei.

"Our mom's brother's kid, yeah. Believe it or not, our mom is pale," he said with a smile. She didn't know how he could stand having his face uncovered. "I'm Jeen, and this is Kell."

"I'm Vanna, and this is Link," she said as Link hopped off the final sheet of ice on the lake to join her.

Jeen started to reel in his line. "You're Link, eh? Ashei's talked about you some. I'll take you two to her." Finished reeling in the line, he planted the end of his fishing rod deep in the snow, and it stayed upright when he let go of it. "Be back soon, Kell."

He turned around and took off, and Link and Vanna followed behind him. After rounding the cliff that bordered the left of the lake, a series of log cabins came into view. Like the shacks in Kakariko, nearly all of the windows were boarded up, and a few of the roofs looked crudely patched. One cabin was missing a roof entirely.

In front of one of the cabins, Jeen stopped to turn to them, and he spoke quietly. "Ashei should be in here, along with our grandparents, my mother, and my daughter. Don't be surprised if my mother and grandparents are cranky. They always are to begin with, but things haven't been going well in our village lately. The blizzard that's been hitting the province has been devastating, and we've also had a beast ransacking our kitchens in the middle of the night. It'd ... be best to avoid either of those topics."

After using his feet to push away some of the snow that had piled inches high up the door, he opened the door and walked in. Vanna went in next, and then Link stepped in and shut the door behind him. It was colder inside than any house had a right to be, yet it was still much warmer than the glacial outdoors. She pulled her scarf down from her face, but she decided to keep all her other layers where they were for now.

Her eyes were drawn first to a fireplace that she wanted to go warm up by, then to Ashei who was leaning against the wall next to it. A little girl that looked like a mini-Jeen was sitting by the fireplace and drawing on a piece of paper, and an old man and woman, each with light skin and gray-white hair, were sitting on a couch by the girl. Across from them was someone else with graying dark brown hair, who she presumed to be Kell and Jeen's mother, sitting in a rocking chair that faced away from them.

"You've got visitors, Ashei," Jeen announced.

Everyone except the woman in the rocking chair looked their way. Ashei started walking over to them, and the little girl abandoned her drawing to run to Jeen.

"Daddy!" she said, jumping into his arms. "Are you and Uncle Kell all done ice fishing?"

"No, not yet. I only came to let Ashei's visitors in. I have to go back," Jeen said. The little girl pouted and whined. "We'll come back home when we get enough fish to feed all of us for today, all right, Bree?"

She nodded, still pouting, and Jeen put her back on the floor. He gave them a short wave before stepping around them and leaving, letting in a blast of chilled air that made Vanna shiver. Bree ran back to the fireplace as Ashei came to a stop in front of them.

"What are you two doing here?" Ashei asked. "Did Telma send you?"

"No, but she did tell us we could find you here. We came to talk to you," Link said.

"Who comes to a place like this just to talk to someone?" the old lady grumbled.

Ashei looked back at her. "This is Link, the guy I was talking about. He could probably help us." The old lady humphed, and Ashei sat down at a table and gestured to the seats across from her. "What did you come to talk about?"

"Remember that mirror I asked about last time we were at the bar?" Vanna said as she and Link sat down.

"The one Shad said might be somewhere in the desert, yeah? Did you find it?" Ashei asked.

"We found part of it," Link said.

"It was broken, and three shards of it are hidden around Hyrule," Vanna said. "We heard that one shard is somewhere in Snowpeak. Have you seen it?"

Ashei breathed out an unamused laugh. "You can hardly see anything in this blizzard. No." She crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair. "But I haven't been outside much... You see, I've been staying inside to try to catch a beast that's been breaking into houses in this village and stealing dairy and fruit."

"Dairy and fruit that we pay a good price to get all the way out here."

The person who had spoken up had to be Kell and Jeen's mother, since it was clearly a woman's voice and she and the old man were the only people Vanna hadn't heard talk yet—but that didn't stop Vanna's heart from reacting to the fact that the woman sounded exactly like her mom.

Then, when she stood up from her rocking chair and turned to face them, Vanna's heart somehow managed to beat even faster. It didn't just sound like her mom: it was her mom.

She walked over and sat down next to Ashei while Vanna sat frozen in her seat, mind racing yet unable to form any logical thoughts.

"Ashei says you're a helper, yeah?" she said to Link. "Think you can help us track down that rotten thief?"

"We can try. If the beast's a thief, it might've also stolen what we're lookin' for," Link said.

She looked at Vanna and curled her lip. "This little dolt is your assistant?"

Vanna flinched out of her daze.

"She's not my 'assistant,' she's my friend," Link said. "You want our help, don't you?"

"Dolt?" Vanna quietly repeated, frowning.

There was no recognition on her face as they locked eyes, only contempt. "You've been sitting there staring at me with a stupid look on your face," she sneered.

Underneath her strict parenting, Vanna's mom was a good-natured woman. Her actions, as angry as many of them had made Vanna, had always come from a place of love, and her intentions were never malicious. Never, in a million years, would Daina have spoken to her or looked at her like that.

This woman's callousness made Vanna realize that she was merely another doppelganger, but she was still stunned by her appearance even knowing that was all she was. The other doppelgangers had their differences, and this woman was identical to her mom. The only visual giveaway that they weren't the same person was her clothes that she knew her mom didn't own, but it wasn't like her mom couldn't have borrowed clothes from Hyrule as she had done. Everything else about them was the exact same; the way their hair parted in the middle and ended bluntly an inch above their shoulders, the little wrinkles between their eyebrows, their thin lips, their narrow eyes the same shade of hazel as hers...

And she had two sons, Kell and Jeen. Like Vanna's sisters, Kalina and Jaylene. Looking past the obvious differences in sex and race, Vanna could see some physical similarities between Kell and Kalina, and Jeen and Jaylene. Jeen even had a daughter named Bree, like how Jaylene had a son named Gabriel—and though Bree might have been a few years older than Gabriel, it was easy to imagine that they would someday look similar, too.

In the span of an hour, she had run into the Hyrulean version of practically every person in her family. Just a couple of things seemed wrong. For one, this woman's parents looked absolutely nothing like her mom's parents, though Vanna supposed that she along with Kell and Jeen proved there was a spectrum of how similar or dissimilar Hyrulean counterparts could be. For two, she didn't have a cousin that matched up with Ashei; she didn't have a cousin, period, because both of her parents were only children. For three, Iza and Kell apparently weren't together like Ami and Kalina.

The only people missing from the picture were her dad and Vanna, but she guessed they could've been dead here like they were at home.

"Seriously, Daina, these two might be our only help, yeah?" Ashei said. The woman even had the same name as her mom.

"I'm sorry for staring, Daina," Vanna said, having trouble getting her name out. "I was just wondering—um, are Kell and Jeen your only kids?"

"I'm the rude one for not liking some girl staring me down like a dope, eh?" Daina said, glaring at her. "Don't you think it's rude to enter the house of someone you don't know and start demanding to be given information about their family?"

"Yeah, Kell and Jeen are her only children," Ashei answered. "Their father left when they were young, and she's been bitter since."

Daina clicked her tongue and directed her glare toward Ashei.

It seemed it wasn't necessarily that the Hyrulean versions of her dad and Vanna had died here, then—they had never been a part of this family in the first place. Vanna wondered, since families clearly didn't always match up all the way, if the Hyrulean Vanna was out there somewhere with a different mother.

"Anyway," Ashei said slowly. "I caught a glimpse of the beast one night, yeah? Apparently, the Zoras have been catching glimpses of it in their domain, too. Each time someone here has spotted it, it's been holding a type of red fish that don't live in the lake here, so it must be stealing them from Zora's Domain. I wanna investigate further, but it's not safe to try to follow the beast in this blizzard..."

"I'm sure we could track it down," Link said.

"Hold on," Ashei said. She pushed herself away from the table, walked to a desk, and came back with a piece of paper. "This is what the beast looks like."

She sat the paper on the table and pushed it over to them. The drawing on it was of a large creature holding a red fish in one hand and a pumpkin in the other. It looked like it could have been drawn by the little girl.

"...Look, I'm not an artist," Ashei said.

"This is good enough," Link said, grabbing the paper. "So, the beast always gets this type of fish from the domain?"

"Always that red fish. It never steals any of the fish from here, only dairy and fruit. Maybe you can talk to the Zoras and see if they have any idea why it'd want it. Knowing why it's stealing might put us a step closer to stopping it, yeah?"

"Couldn't it just ... I don't know ... want food?" Vanna said.

Daina scoffed. "It's been living in Snowpeak for years, and only in the last month or so has it started stealing food. You think it survived just fine on its own for years and all of a sudden it needs to start stealing now?"

Vanna would have been snappy right back to her if she were anyone else, but as it were, Daina's rudeness only upset her. It hurt to hear her mom's voice speak like that to her, though she knew she wasn't actually her mom.

"All right, we're leaving," Link said abruptly, standing up and stashing the drawing away. Vanna stood up as well, grateful he was getting them out. "Thanks for the help, Ashei. We'll let you know what we find."

"I'll be heading back to Castle Town soon, so you can come find me in the bar, yeah?" she said.

"Yeah. See you."

Link placed his hand on the small of Vanna's back and took a step toward the door. She returned the glare Daina was giving her and left without a word.

Chapter Text

Link had Midna warp them back to Upper Zora's River after they left the cabin, saying Vanna was too cold to walk all the way back and that warping was safer than going over the frozen lake again. While Vanna thought it was kind of patronizing of him to assume she couldn't handle walking for a few minutes, she didn't try to talk him out of it because she was miserably cold—and she wanted to get far enough away from Daina that she could tell Link about her.

"I seriously thought that woman was my mom when I first saw her," she said once he was in his human form again. "They look exactly alike. It's not like it is with Ami and Iza or Ilia and Maddie where they have some differences—they're identical! She even has the same name as my mom! And Kell and Jeen are like male Inuit versions of Kalina and Jaylene—not that you'd even know what Inuits are—and Jeen has a daughter that's like Jaylene's son but a few years older, and Kell and Jeen's dad left when they were young just like Kalina and Jaylene's dad did, and—!"

"Vanna," Link interrupted. She shut her mouth, and he grinned. "I get it. They look alike."

She took in a breath and let it out slowly. "There's no way it's just a coincidence anymore that people from here match up with people where I'm from. Our worlds... They're even closer than I thought."

Link was silent for several moments, a contemplative look on his face. "...I wonder ... if there's a version of you here. That's why you asked Daina if she had any other kids, right?"

Though he was speaking of something she had already considered, his words made an exciting idea strike her. "If she's out here, maybe I can get her to pretend she's me and that I've used magic or something to turn into a human, and then Mr. Rider will leave me alone!"

Link smiled at that, but his expression fell after a few seconds. "But we don't even know if she'd look enough like you to pass as you. What if you two are more like Kell and Kalina? She could be a he, for all we know."

To her dismay, he was right. There was no guarantee that her counterpart would be exactly like her. There wasn't even a guarantee that her counterpart was alive. "Yeah..." Vanna sighed. "I know there might not be a perfect lookalike of me here, but maybe we could look anyway... After we find the beast, that is."

"We can try... But try not to get your hopes up." He reached back into one of his pouches, and his arm came back around with Ashei's sketch in hand. "Let's go show this to the Zoras and see if they can help us."

As they made their way back to the domain, Vanna's mind raced with fantasies of her scheme. She imagined what would happen if they found her doppelganger—how they would ask her to pretend to be her, how they would have her 'prove' to Mr. Rider that she was a human, how he would react... Though she knew it wasn't good to get her hopes up, it was hard not to. It was the best idea she had to get Mr. Rider away from her.

Being caught up in her imagination, she nearly walked right into a Zora that ran over to them.

"Link!" the Zora said. "Do you remember me?"

"I've met you?" Link said.

The Zora looked from Vanna to him confusedly. "I saw you with Link the second time she went to Lakebed Temple, but I never properly introduced myself to you—or the Hero, herself." Vanna's eyes widened with recognition, and the Zora flashed a sharp smile at her. "I'm Nola. Are both of you named Link...?"

"I remember you!" Vanna said. "And yeah, my friend's name is also Link. Small world. But, uh, I don't remember ever telling you my name was Link..."

"Link is the name of the Hero according to Zoran legends, and I figured at least that part of the legends had to be right. Anyway, I just wanted to tell you we're here if you ever need anything!"

Link and Vanna shared a look at that, and then he showed the drawing to her. "Does this look familiar to you?" he asked.

Nola's eyes lit up. "Yes! That's the beast of Snowpeak that's been seen in our domain recently... And, oh! The red fish it's holding is a reekfish!"

"Is there something special about reekfish that would make the beast want them?" Vanna asked.

"They're extremely nutritious, and very filling. Perhaps the beast is having trouble acquiring the food it usually gets from the mountain with how terrible the weather has been there lately. It's quite shocking to see the beast with a reekfish, however. I thought Prince Ralis was the only one capable of catching them, but he's been missing from the domain for months... Do you perchance know where he's been since he ordered you to go into our temple?"

"Ralis has been in Kakariko Village this whole time," Vanna said.

Had she known the commotion that sentence would have caused, she'd have said it much quieter.

Several nearby Zoras overheard it and soon there was a crowd of them clamoring for information on the Prince they'd assumed dead. Link and Vanna took turns answering their questions, repeatedly assuring them that he was alive and well, and promising to bring him home. The Zoras dispersed one by one to spread the news until it was just them and Nola again.

"Everyone will be waiting eagerly for Prince Ralis's return," Nola said. She reached out to grab Vanna's hands, and she could feel their dampness through her gloves. "Thank you for doing this for us. If you have the time, you are more than welcome to visit whenever you like."

Ralis was kneeling in front of his mother's grave when they returned to Kakariko Village. Before they had gone back to the graveyard to speak to him, Link and Vanna had decided that their best course of action was to ask him if he could catch a reekfish for them—it would get him back to his village, and get them the fish the beast wanted.

He slowly swam through the little pond and over to them when they called for him, but he stayed in the water instead of getting up on land with them. Link crouched down and showed him the sketch, and asked if he recognized anything from it.

"The beast-man of the snowy mountain ... and a reekfish?" Ralis said. "Where did you get this drawing?"

"From someone who lives on the mountain. The beast has been showing up and taking food from the mountain village and your home village," Link said.

"And since we know he keeps getting reekfish, we'd like to get one ourselves to help track him down," Vanna said.

"It won't be possible for you to catch one as you'd catch any other fish. The reekfish feeds only on a valuable type of coral, and even our best fishers cannot catch one without that bait..." Ralis grabbed an ornament from the end of one of the fins that framed his face and showed it to them. "My earring is made of that coral. I received it from my mother... But you can have it. You can find the reekfish near the Mother-and-Child rocks in the waterfall basin in the domain. They're the only rocks that stick out of the water."

"You don't have to give us something that came from your mother," she said. "Maybe you could just go up to the domain and catch a reekfish for us."

Ralis pursed his lips and looked down at the earring. "I have felt unbearably guilty for abandoning my village, but I have so little confidence... How could I possibly face them? I could not even carry out one simple task for my mother..."

"Your people have been desperate for you to come back. They want you home," Link said.

"They do...?" Ralis quietly asked.

"Yes, they really do. And I think your mother would've wanted you to go home, too..."

Ralis slowly nodded, and then pulled the earring off and held it out. "I will return to my village, but I would still like to hand this on to you. I no longer need it."

"Thank you, Prince Ralis," Link said as he grabbed the earring. "So, how are we getting you home?"

"I can get home myself," Ralis said. He pointed to an opening at the bottom of the pond. "The underwater tunnel here leads to Lake Hylia, and from there I can swim up the river to my home. That will be much quicker and safer for me than any other way. Even if you two travel by horse, I should be there before you."

"We'll see about that," Vanna said with a grin.

After Ralis bid them farewell and swam into the tunnel, Midna warped them to Upper Zora's River once again. Mere minutes later, they were back in the domain. Unsurprisingly, Ralis didn't beat them there.

Only a few Zoras remained in or around the water basin, and Vanna caught a few swimming up the waterfall to the throne room, presumably to wait for Ralis. She was entranced by the sight of them practically defying physics. They disappeared above the waterfall around the same time that she and Link made it to the Mother-and-Child rocks, and she turned her attention to the water in front of her.

The reekfish stood out clearly beneath the water, each at least two feet long, colored a vibrant scarlet that outshone the dull red in Ashei's sketch. It didn't hit Vanna until she saw them that she had no idea how they were supposed to catch one with only a hook, but that question was answered as soon as it came. Link pulled a simple-looking fishing pole out of a pouch and got to work attaching the hook to its line.

"Since when have you had that?" she asked.

"Colin made it for me a couple days before ... all of this." Link took in a heavy breath before giving her a borderline-convincing smile. "I think he'd be happy I'm finally gettin' some use out of it."

With a heave, he brought the pole back and flung it forward, and the line went flying over to the rocks. Figuring it might take a while for a fish to bite, Vanna hoisted herself up onto a nearby ledge to sit and wait.

She was prepared for boredom, but watching him fish turned out to be both relaxing and entertaining. Even with the coral hook, the reekfish were hesitant to bite, making it that much more enthralling each time they did—and more disappointing each time they escaped. As she cheered him on when he snagged another, it occurred to her that she never would've been so invested watching someone fish three months ago.

Finally, after several unsuccessful attempts, Link landed a reekfish. Disgust overtook the gratification of him having caught it, however, when an extremely potent, foul stench permeated the air.

"Ew!" Vanna yelled, pulling her scarf up over her nose. "God, can the beast not smell?!"

The fish managed to wriggle itself off the hook, and it flopped down to the ground. Link stashed his fishing pole away quickly and reached down to grab it by the tail.

"Nasty as this is... It'll be perfect for tracking the beast down. The scent's so strong, I'll bet the beast left a trail with it I could follow right through the blizzard." He looked around the domain before crouching down behind the ledge where he couldn't be seen. "Midna, no one's looking. Transform me?"

The crystal shot from Vanna's shadow into Link, and his body changed shape. She pitied him as he put his nose right up to the fish and sniffed. If it smelled that bad normally, she couldn't imagine how much worse it had to be to the sensitive nose of a wolf.

Once he had smelled it thoroughly, he nudged it back into the water and turned toward the tunnel to Snowpeak. He made a motion with his tail for her to follow him and she hopped down off the ledge. Preemptively wrapping her arms around herself for extra warmth, and keeping her fingers crossed that the trail would be short and easy to follow, they entered the tunnel.

With the solid gray clouds of the blizzard blocking the rays of the sun, it was impossible to tell how long they had been traveling until they reached a point on the mountain that wasn't being hit as hard. By then, stars were visible through a break in the clouds. It had probably been around eleven in the morning when they'd started taking the trail, and considering that the sun was going down at around five in the evening with it nearly being winter, they'd been on the trail for about six hours minimum.

During a quick detour for Link to howl at one of the Hero's Shade's stones, Vanna's heart stopped again. After the time that had happened in the desert, she knew very well that it was a sign of impending shutdown, but she couldn't think straight enough to say anything. So, she suffered in silence, trudging along behind Link. He looked back at her a few minutes after it had stopped—something he'd been doing frequently along the way—before stopping and turning toward her. He signaled Midna to transform him back into a human, and then he gave Vanna his thick coat, saying he could tell that she was on the verge of being too cold to function. While the extra clothes helped warm her up somewhat, her heart stayed motionless.

Many attacks by ice wolves and ice bats later, the trail led them to a round door built into the face of an insurmountable cliff. She attempted to open it, but her hands were too shaky and she was too weak. Link had Midna transform him back into a human so he could open it for them.

Vanna stepped into the dark cave first, and Link let the door roll shut behind them. She reached a hand under the layers of her clothes to pull out her glowing necklace at the same time that Link pulled out a lantern. It was expectantly still cold inside, but it was a nice respite from the wind and snow that made the outside world so much colder.

Link sat his lantern on the ground and walked over to where a few pots and wooden crates were stacked along the edge of the cave. Without explaining himself, he smashed a few crates up. Fruits fell out of them, but he ignored them and formed the slices of wood into a pile. Vanna sat down in front of it eagerly once she realized what he was doing. He lit the woodpile up with a spark from his fingertip and sat next to her. It took a while for the fire to really start burning. In the meantime, they ate some of the dry food they had packed in their pouches.

The flames didn't make the cave truly warm by a long shot, but they warmed Vanna up enough that her heart began to beat again. The second beat came several seconds after the first, and it continued at a sluggish pace from there. She sighed, relieved.

"You feelin' better?" Link asked. She nodded. "Good. I thought we were gonna have a repeat of the desert."

"Almost did," she said. "M-my heart stopped beating earlier again. It just started back up."

Link stared at her blankly for a second, silent. "...Your heart stopped?"

She shrugged. "It did b-back in the desert, too."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"In the desert? 'Cause Maha-Mahana was th-there when it happened. And now—I don't know, y-you were busy f-following the trail..." Vanna shrugged again. "It-it's not like it matters. It doesn't pump blood. It just ... pumps."

"Still. You could've told me. I would've given you my coat earlier and hurried up." He scooted a bit closer to the fire and glanced around the cave. "I bet the beast hides out here often—and I bet the fruits in the crates are what he's stolen from the village. So, this is probably the best place to stay tonight... There's no way of knowin' if there'll be another cave along the trail for us to rest in."

"Bu-but what about the scent? What if the blizzard blows it away or covers it up by tomorrow morning?"

"Then we could wait and see if the beast comes back here, or we could have Midna warp us back to Zora's Domain and start fresh once the monster comes for another reekfish, but I doubt that'll happen. That blizzard might be strong, but my sense of smell is stronger." Link yawned, and then his body shook in a violent shiver. "Hey, Midna?"

"What?" her disembodied voice responded. "I am not coming out of the shadows, if that's what you're about to ask. I'm perfectly content not getting frostbite."

"I wasn't gonna ask you to come out. I was gonna ask you to transform me again. The cold's a lot worse not having fur."

"I can give you your coat back," Vanna said, moving her hands up to unbutton it.

"No, keep it on. You're still freezing even with it. I'll help you get warmed up as a wolf." He backed up from the fire, giving himself adequate room to transform. "Midna?"

Staying hidden in Vanna's shadow, Midna flung the crystal at him, and he became a wolf again. He returned to Vanna's side and sat down, sitting so close that he pressed against her. She could feel his warmth radiating even through all her layers of clothes. She wrapped an arm over his back and rested her head on him.

Eventually, they both ended up laying down—him curled up, and her curled up half-on him and half-spooning him. She fell asleep to the sound of his even breaths and the crackling fire.

And she woke to the sound of the rock-door rolling open.

Only, when she shot up and looked back at the door they had come in through, it was still closed and nothing was there. Link was up fast as well, giving three quick barks to signal Midna to turn him back into a human, and reaching for his sword as soon as he was. They stayed very still, his hand lingering around his sword's hilt, listening for more. Heavy footfalls came from the other side of the cave, around a bend they couldn't see past.

The creature that stomped around the bend looked as surprised to see them as they were to see it. It was huge, standing over ten feet tall, its width taking up most of the cave. It had large, bright eyes, and tusks, and light fur that almost looked like a quilt in places covered its body, including its giant platypus-like tail. Its skin, where it was visible, was scaly and green. Vanna knew she had to be building up tolerance to the strange creatures in Hyrule, because she thought the strangest thing about it was the saddle it wore in place of a hat. It was cute, in a weird way.

"Uh? Humans?" it said in a gravelly, silly voice.

Link slowly lowered his hand. "You're the beast of Snowpeak?" he asked.

"Uh, I not beast. I Yeti, name Yeto. Yeto not see humans often, uh? Why humans come to snows?" His large eyes narrowed a touch. "You ... on spiritual journey? You look for true self?"

"Umm, no. We're..." Link trailed off into a yawn and reached up to rub at one of his eyes.

"We're looking for something," Vanna said. "There's a broken mirror in the Gerudo Desert, and the pieces of it are all over Hyrule. We heard one was here in Snowpeak."

"You look for mirror in such faraway place..." Yeto suddenly burst into laughter that echoed throughout the cave. "You lucky to meet me, uh! I found shiny mirror piece. Maybe same mirror you look for?"

That seemed to knock all the remaining sleepiness out of Link. "You have it?"

"Uh huh. It at house. You come and see yourself!" Yeto walked over to where Link had smashed the crates and grabbed the fruits that had been in them. "I make you good meal, uh. Come!"

Yeto turned and walked away. Vanna hurried to put back on her belts and weaponry that she'd discarded, and then she and Link followed after him. At the end of the winding cave was another rolling door like the one on the other side, which Yeto opened for them before ducking through himself.

It took Vanna's eyes a moment to adjust from the dark gray of the cave to the bright white of outside and another moment for her to adjust to the thinner air. The sky was clear enough that she could tell it was very early in the morning, and she could see that they were practically at the summit. They were up higher than all of the countless surrounding peaks; ascending a relatively small hill would bring them to the very top of the mountain.

A few steps out into the snow, black spires shot down and planted themselves in the ground, forming a barricade around them. Vanna looked up at the sky, hoping that this wasn't what she thought it was, and quickly losing that hope.

Shadow Beasts fell from the black and red portal in the sky and landed with them in the barricade they'd brought with them. There were only three this time—that made Vanna annoyed that the one time she'd had to fight them alone, there had been five, which wasn't fair at all—but she didn't let herself be grateful, because she knew thinking something would be easy always jinxed it.

Yeto tried to escape, dropping a few fruits along the way, only to find that he couldn't get past the barriers. He worriedly asked Link and Vanna what was going on, but they were too caught up in trying to fight the Shadow Beasts off to answer. Vanna stayed back and fired arrow after arrow at one of them while Link slashed away at the other two, always managing to hit both with his swings.

The Shadow Beast she was firing at continually tried to charge at her, only to stumble back with each arrow, but it was getting closer each time. When it got too close, she ditched her bow and pulled out her sword. She didn't bother swinging; she merely shot it straight out, and the Shadow Beast couldn't stop its charge in time. It impaled itself on her sword and slumped over with a final gritty breath. It took a strong yank with both hands to get her sword out of its torso.

She looked over at Link in time to see him spin in a fast circle that nearly sliced the remaining beasts in half. Their lifeless bodies fell into the snow at his feet, and he twirled his sword before sheathing it. The Shadow Beasts and the spires surrounding them flickered into dark squares and shot off into the twilight portal above.

"...Uh... You... What those were, uh?" Yeto asked, his eyes bulging out even more than they normally did.

"Those were Shadow Beasts," Vanna said as she picked up her bow from where she'd thrown it aside.

"Good thing you two good fighters. Mirror make house turn bad, uh. Lots of monsters." Yeto retrieved the fruits he'd dropped and then started up the incline. "Come on! Way to house up here, uh."

Vanna looked Link over as they followed behind him, trying to see if the beasts had gotten him while she wasn't looking. Thankfully, there were no tears in his clothes and there wasn't any blood on him.

The three of them stopped beside a tree at the peak. Yeto used his tail to smack the tree forcefully, making one of the large frozen leaves fall.

"We slide to house, uh. Do like me!"

Yeto walked to the leaf and planted one foot on it. After gaining his balance, he used his other foot to push himself, and he went sliding down the slope. Vanna stared after him with her jaw slack.

"Okay, I cannot snowboard," she said. "Zi made me try once, and I ended up falling and sliding down on my face. I'm sledding instead."

Link laughed and rammed his shoulder up against the tree until two leaves were on the ground. She sat down on one while he stood atop the other.

"You know," he said, "I could give you a piggyback ride down, or ride behind you. That leaf's big enough for two."

She contemplated that for a moment. She was more than okay with the idea of being so close to him, and she thought it would be especially fun for them to sled down together. On the other hand, she already had something more fun in mind.

"Race ya!"

Vanna used her hands to push herself down, and suddenly she was speeding away from him. She wanted to look back to see if he was on her tail, but she didn't want to risk veering off and slamming into a rock. The wind whipped against her face, so cold it burned even when she pulled her scarf up, but she was having so much fun she hardly cared.

A few minutes down the mountain, she saw something appear out of the corner of her eye. She glanced over, and Link was there, smiling. She laughed and tried to push herself to go faster. They were neck and neck from there right up until the end. Link crouched further and leaned forward, getting ahead of her. The path to the house narrowed and swerved. He was nearly past the curve when she couldn't stop herself from slamming directly into him.

They both went tumbling off their makeshift boards and rolling to the end of the slope in a tangle of limbs. It didn't exactly feel too great, and yet they were laughing all the way. When they stopped, they lay on their backs on the thin snow, catching their breath and gaining their composure.

Vanna sat up on her knees and tried to shake the snow off of her, and then she looked up and saw the house ahead of them just a short bridge away—although, 'house' was an understatement. She'd been expecting something like the houses in Tabantha Village, more of a cabin than anything, but it was a gothic mansion. She guessed it made enough sense for a giant creature to have a matching giant house, but the dark architecture clashed with the light image she had of him.

As Link sat up, she looked back at him. Flecks of snow covered his hair—his hat had fallen off—and his face and ears were all pink, and he was still smiling. Her heart thumped faster, and she smiled back.

With a start, she remembered something. Vanna scrambled to her feet and ran across the bridge to the staircase leading up to the mansion.

"I win!"

Chapter Text

Vanna had been hoping that the inside of Yeto's mansion would be warmer. As per usual anymore, her hope had been in vain.

A large section of the gabled roof of the foyer had collapsed, allowing snow to drift in. All around, the inside was more dilapidated than the view from outside had let on, filled with damaged remnants of prior grandeur. Both sets of staircases that led up to the second floor were so broken as to be unusable, leaving a tall set of double doors as Link and Vanna's only way to pass through to where Yeto was presumably waiting for them.

On the other side of those double doors wasn't Yeto, but what Vanna assumed was a human woman at first glance. She was lounging against a couch by a small fireplace, bundled up in a thick full-body sweater with no armholes.

After she turned her head toward them slowly, Vanna changed her mind about the woman being human. She was close, to be sure, but no amount of normal human variation would have led to a face proportioned the way hers was. With her huge bug eyes and strangely wide head, she was reminiscent of Midna in a way. Vanna wasn't sure if she was a Yeti or not, though, since she lacked the tusks, platypus tail, green scaly skin, and immense size of Yeto.

"Who...?" She stopped to cough. "Sorry, uh... I have sickness. Come closer, uh?"

Vanna's certainty that she wasn't human doubled when they approached her and she noticed that her wide feet each looked to have two soles in one. It was hard to keep herself from asking what she was.

Her tiny mouth spread into a weak grin, revealing rodent-like buck teeth. "You cute little humans, uh. Husband told me you come to see pretty mirror he find for me. He in kitchen now making us food. Sit with me and find mirror after eat, uh?"

She motioned with her weird feet at the carpet in front of her. They sat down across from her at her request, with Vanna about as close as she could be to the fireplace without catching on fire.

"Where's the mirror at?" Vanna asked.

"Oh, uh... Since I get mirror, I get sick, and then bad monsters appear. So many bad things happen since mirror... So we lock it in bedroom on third floor and hide key. But, uh, I not sure where key is... Fever makes head blurry."

A sudden loud bang shook the room, making Link and Vanna jolt. Looking toward where the noise had come from, it turned out to only be Yeto bursting through a door. Vanna wondered how the door and the wall it smacked against weren't broken, especially if that was how he always entered rooms.

"New friends here!" Yeto bellowed. "Sorry I scare, uh. What I miss?"

"They ask where mirror is, uh... But I not remember where I hide key to bedroom."

"Ah... Told you let me hide it, uh," Yeto said, scratching his head. "It be a while until soup done, uh. Maybe they go look for key while wait? I can't leave soup alone long, uh..."

Link turned back to Vanna. "Why don't I go? You can keep her company."

"I'll go with you," she said.

"Wouldn't you rather stay inside by the fire and get warmed up? I'll be fine on my own."

"But you know there's gonna be monsters. I don't want you to have to fight them alone just because I'm a baby about the cold."

"Your problem with the cold is more than you bein' a 'baby' about it. It's dangerous for you to be in extreme temperatures."

"Hardly. I can't get frostbite or die of hypothermia. You can."

"Not with my built-in fur coat."

She didn't have a retort for that. Link realized as much, and having won, he rose to his feet and subtly tapped her shadow with his foot.

"So," Link said to Yeto's wife, "you got any clue where the key might be?"

"Uh... Maybe...? Leave kitchen, go to hallway, then room with weapon, then next room I think I leave key in, uh. Should be in chest."

"I show you on map of mansion in kitchen, uh," Yeto said. "Come!"

Link followed Yeto into the room he'd come in from, leaving Vanna alone with Yeto's wife. The woman said nothing to her, making her wonder if she didn't care to have company or if she simply felt too ill to do much talking. Sighing, Vanna rested her head against the column next to the fireplace.

For a multitude of reasons, she found herself regretting letting Link and Midna both leave her with a sickly, seemingly armless Yeti-like creature. It occurred to her that, though this was the Yeti's house, this had to technically be a temple, too—Snowpeak Ruins, as Zi had called it—which meant it was very likely more dangerous than any regular old house with monsters, with devious puzzles and death traps abound. And then, thinking of Zi brought her mind back to the day before, to her conversation with the fortuneteller, Fanadi, who had told her that 'son and father' were coming, 'soon.' She wanted to go back and demand a more concrete answer as to how soon 'soon' was.

Unable to suppress the feeling that 'soon' was much sooner than she'd ever anticipate, she tried to decode the last cryptic words Fanadi had given her before she'd told her to fly away—'Death is on the table... But the answer is with you.'

She went through countless potential answers in her head, none seeming more likely than the last, and she was left feeling frustrated and even more anxious. How was she supposed to know if she had the answer right or not?

When she couldn't handle thinking about it anymore, she decided to try to talk to Yeto's wife to distract herself. "What's your name?"

"Husband not tell you, uh? My name Yeta."

"Yeta?" Vanna repeated, and Yeta nodded. "...Is it just a coincidence that you and your husband have matching names?"

Yeta's giggle at her question turned into coughs, and she was still grinning when she got over her fit. "Uh, you know nothing of Yeti, do you? It okay, uh. That our family name. O-ending male, A-ending female, you get?"

"Oh. I didn't think family names were much of a thing here. So... You are a Yeti? You look a lot more human than your husband."

"That because I half, uh. Mother human, father Yeti."

Vanna's imagination going places she never wanted it to, she almost regretted asking. Almost. Horrified as she was for Yeta's mother, she was also burning with curiosity and teeming with more questions that she probably didn't really want the answers to.

At least talking to Yeta had certainly gotten her mind off of everything else bothering her.

"Now you know about me, I ask you, uh? What your and friend names, and why you want see mirror?" Yeta asked.

It figured she was casual about a human-Yeti relationship given that she was the product of it, but Vanna struggled to move her mind off that track. "Um, I'm Vanna, and my friend is Link. And the mirror... It's kinda a long story, but to keep it short, it's a fragment of a really important mirror and we need all the pieces, so—"

A murderous glare suddenly appeared on Yeta's face. "You here to take it?!" she snarled.

Her outburst led to another bout of coughing, during which Vanna stumbled over words trying to apologetically explain why it was so important for them to take it. When Yeta calmed, her stare was blank, like she was looking right through her. Her eyes blinked closed, and her head fell back against the couch.

Vanna stayed where she was for a moment, wondering what the hell had just happened before she got up to go tell Yeto.

Yeto said he'd seen her become furiously defensive about the mirror multiple times. He had suggested getting rid of it since it seemed to be what had made her ill to begin with, but she'd insisted on keeping it, and locking it away in their house was the only compromise they could come to that didn't anger her. Apparently, it was common for her to fall asleep after each outburst, but he still wanted to go check on her quickly, so he told Vanna to keep an eye on his soup while he went.

"Psst! Vanna?" a voice quietly called out, making her jump.

It sounded like the voice had come from behind a shelf, so she poked her head around it to look. Amid an assortment of wooden crates, rolled-up rugs, folded quilts, and other odds and ends were several pots, and a chicken foot was poking out of one of them.

"Ooccoo," Vanna breathed out. She walked over to her and helped get her and her son out once again, and once again found that they were still disturbing to see. "Seriously, haven't we been over how you shouldn't keep getting into pots?"

"Oh, but I had to this time! The beast-man was going to cook me! You must let us into your pouch before he comes back!"

It took some effort to get her pouch off her belt from under Link's thick coat with gloved fingers, but she did it, and Ooccoo and her son slipped inside just in time. The door opened back up and Yeto called for her. She hurried back around to the other side of the shelf, clipping her pouch back to her belt as she moved.

"I'm here," she said.

"Uh! What you do back there? I ask you watch soup, uh."

"Sorry. It didn't look like it was gonna boil over or anything, so I thought it was okay to look around...?" She shrugged. "You know, some of those quilts you have back there look like you."

He let out a laugh so boisterous that she felt his warm breath standing yards away from him. "That because they made out of me fur I shed, uh! You wear if like. You looks cold."

"Um, I'm good. Thanks."

Yeto patted a crate near his cooking pot and told her to sit and make herself comfortable in here since Yeta was still out of it. She ended up liking it more there than out by the fireplace anyway—the cooking pot, being bigger than her, required a much larger fire to keep the soup inside boiling, making the kitchen warm enough that she could nearly forget she was out in the middle of her own personal frozen hellscape.

She was trying to politely decline Yeto's offer to taste-test his soup—which reeked, unsurprisingly, of reekfish—when a frost-covered Link made it back with a pumpkin. His skin, where it wasn't obscured by the glittery white ice crystals, was a bright red.

Yeto and Vanna were both rushing over to him as soon as they saw him, though it turned out that Yeto was only interested in the pumpkin and not the affliction Link was very clearly in. The ferocity he yanked the pumpkin away from Link with was enough to send Link tumbling to the floor.

"Seriously?" Vanna shouted toward Yeto as she crouched down next to Link.

"Pumpkin make for better soup flavor, uh!" was the only justification Yeto gave before taking the pumpkin over to his cutting board.

Her hands hovered awkwardly in front of Link, feeling like she had to do something but having no idea where to even begin. "So much for your built-in fur coat, huh?" she mumbled.

"Paws aren't good at holding pumpkins," he responded innocently. "Needed hands."

"You might not even have hands much longer if you stay like this. Come on, let's go by the fire."

He was stiff standing up, like his body had turned into the ice that covered him. Once he was sitting down next to the fire, Vanna raised a finger, told him to stay put, and went back around the shelf. She returned with one of the quilts made out of Yeto's fur and went to wrap it around him, only to be surprised when he tried to move out of the way.

"I don't want that," he said. "It's already hot enough with the fire here."

It took her a second to realize he wasn't joking. Curiously, she slipped off a glove and reached out to touch his cheek. The second skin met skin, Link winced away and hissed. Had she not known she was touching his face, she would have assumed it was ice.

"Jesus, Link," she said. "You're freezing."

"No, your hand's just like fire. I'm hot."

"Maybe you feel that way, but—"

"'Cause it's true."

"Link," she said slowly. "I know normal temperatures can feel uncomfortably warm when you're cold—and yes, you are cold, even if you think you're not—but that doesn't mean you should avoid getting warm. You need to get warmed up, unless you wanna die. So I'm gonna put this blanket back on you, okay? For your own good."

He wasn't happy about it, but this time he let her wrap it around him. It swallowed him up, leaving only his head poking out through the top. "You really don't think this is a li'l overkill? I'll drown in my sweat in here before I freeze to death."

"No, it's not overkill, not when you're so cold you don't even know how cold you are. Really, what happened out there? You weren't even gone that long."

"I didn't find the key. The pumpkin I brought back was where the wife said it was."

"That's—well, not surprising she gave you the wrong location, considering how she is right now. But I was trying to ask about..." she gestured to him, moving her hand up and down, "...this. The frost."

"...A Freezard froze me," he admitted. At the look she made, he tacked on, "But I'm fine."

His answer was consistent with the state he was in but confounding at the same time. Freezards were one of the entries from Link's monster encyclopedia that had stuck out to Vanna the most—mainly because the book had led her to believe that being frozen by one was a death sentence. It mentioned strong enough victims being able to break free of the ice that encased them, but hadn't specified what came of those people afterward, hence her assuming death would still come around to them. After all, who could really survive being literally frozen?

"I shouldn't have given in," she muttered. She shook her head and huffed. "Okay, you know what? I'm gonna be the one to look for the key."

"Vanna—"

"No. And don't tell me about your fur coat, because that obviously can't help you if you need hands and you're not in it. It's nowhere near as dangerous for something like that to happen to me as it is to you. I can't get hypothermia. At worst, I'll stop working until I'm back to a normal temperature. It's not a big deal."

"It is a big deal," he said. She went to refute him, but he continued on. "I talked to Zi about you back in the Arbiter's Grounds when we were together, about you passin' out in the heat. He said extreme temperatures can damage you—not just heat. That time alone could've done messed you up more than you know."

"So? Better for me to be damaged than you to be dead."

A moment passed, during which she could watch that statement sinking in, sobering him. He lowered his sight to the ground, and finally gave a quiet, "I guess."

Things got worse for Link before they got better.

Going from so freezing that cold feels like hot to freezing just enough to be painfully aware you're freezing left him yearning for the former, though he knew it was good he'd recovered past that point. All the shivers that'd been suppressed by the previous severity of his condition had hit him full force, to the point where he could hardly raise the spoon to his mouth when Yeto had offered him some soup. Fatigue had caught up to him not long after, and he'd barely made it to the couch in the living room before passing out.

He'd slept through the rest of the day and well into the next. By then, the frost had all thawed and his skin had returned to a more normal color, but he still couldn't stave off the shivers.

They moved back into the kitchen to sit near the cooking pot's large flame for warmth not long after he woke. Come lunchtime, they were eating soup again, this time pumpkin flavored, and Yeto was out in the living room feeding Yeta hers. Vanna finished hers first, what with Link still struggling to have any soup left on his spoon by the time he got it to his mouth.

"Wha-what did you do whi-while I was out?" Link asked after a successful mouthful.

"Read books, went through their collection of paintings... When I got bored, I took Ooccoo and her son out front to build snowmen. Junior wasn't good at it."

Link snorted at the last sentence, which made her laugh, which made him laugh even more. "You went out into the sn-snow for fun?"

Vanna playfully nudged his knee with her foot. "Come on, I'm not that much of a snow-hater that I can't have any fun in it. I liked sledding here yesterday, too, remember?"

"Mm, yeah. Well..." He raised the bowl to his mouth slowly and took a sip of the broth. "Guess we'll have to come back here sometime. Maybe in the summer ... and not in the mid-middle of a blizzard."

A little smile crept up on her face at that. Summer was months away—technically, it wouldn't even be winter yet for a couple more weeks—and all this quest stuff with Midna would probably be over by then ... yet he was still imagining her being there with him after all that time. It made her feel pathetically sentimental to think that she'd become a fixture of his life as much as he'd become one of hers.

"I think I'd like that," she said.

He smiled in return, and let things fall back into a comfortable silence. Link still had some left to go of his meal when Yeto came back to the kitchen a few minutes later, empty bowl in hand.

"Hey," Vanna greeted him. "How's Yeta?"

"Feeling a little better, uh. She say she think she know where key is now," he responded as he sat the bowl down on the countertop. "Green boy, uh, you go look again?"

"Actually, I'm going to look for it," Vanna said, standing and eyeing Link to make sure he didn't intend to go back on his prior agreement.

"Uh, okay." Yeto didn't sound like he particularly cared which one of them was going. "Room not far from here where she say it is, but it dangerous. Go to courtyard, and door across lead straight to room with key in chest, uh... But big ice monster keep appearing in front of it. We move cannon there. You shoot it to get through if it back again, uh."

She imagined he must have been talking about a Freezard, but then his last sentence caught up to her. "Shoot it with a cannon?" she repeated.

"Uh," Yeto said affirmatively.

Vanna blinked a few times, waiting for him to supply more information. He didn't. "...I ... don't know how to shoot a cannon," she finally said.

He stomped over to an open crate and dug around inside it, and his hands came back out with a crumpled, sooty sheet of paper. "Here," he said, shoving it toward her. "Manual for cannons, uh."

"Oh. Thanks." She considered asking him to come help her anyway since he obviously knew how to handle them—she was terrified of accidentally blowing herself to pieces, even with instructions—but decided that she needed to stop being such a wimp. If that walking quilt could use a cannon without blowing himself up, so could she.

Some of the paper looked like it had been blown off, but enough remained of the instructions for her to get the gist of it. She handed it back to Yeto when she was done looking over it. Link told her to be safe before she and Yeto walked out of the kitchen, and she told him she'd try her best not to come back an ice sculpture like he had.

Yeto brought her to the door in the living room that led out to the courtyard, and then there was a quiet knock from the front door, and he left to go see who it was. Vanna took a moment to steel herself before opening the door, but there was no way to prepare herself for the glacial draft that hit her in the face when she did.

It was impossible to miss the Freezard; it was much bigger than she'd thought it would be, rivaling Yeto's size. Also impossible to miss were the wolves made of ice bounding toward her the second they saw her. They were dealt with easily enough, as most of them practically killed themselves by jumping directly into her extended sword, but their numbers made them a nuisance. As one shattered at the end of her blade, another formed from the snow. A few managed to clamp their jaws around her arm, but their teeth were unable to penetrate her skin thanks to the absurd number of thick layers she was wearing.

It was only after she'd finally managed to trudge her way over to the cannon and peeked carefully into its empty barrel that she realized she'd need to hunt down a cannonball. She could see one covered in frost right next to the Freezard, but she was not going up to grab it. Rather than setting out to hunt one down immediately, she opted to try to destroy the Freezard another way—bomb arrows.

The resulting flames from the explosion flickered over its hulking form for less than a second, only to be extinguished in a puff of glittery steam. When the flurries and smoke settled, there was no sign there'd been an explosion at all.

The disappointment from her little failed experiment didn't last long, at least, as she luckily managed to find a few cannonballs stashed in a nearby hallway. Getting one back to the cannon was more of a problem than finding them in the first place. It was so heavy that she needed both hands to carry it, leaving her vulnerable to the ice wolves. Her outer layers were in tatters by the time she made it over, which was at approximately the same time that she remembered she had a magic pouch she could have stuffed it in for the walk over. She was chiding herself for being forgetful—and pondering if some fault could be put on the temperature affecting her—as she pushed the cannonball down the barrel.

She ducked behind a nearby column and clamped her hands over her ears in preparation for the cannon going off. When it did, it shook her body like an earthquake, and the boom made her hearing crackle away to white noise in spite of her effort covering her ears.

Peering back around the column, she saw that the giant, immobilized Freezard was no longer blocking the double doors, but in its place were several chunks of it gliding around. As best as she could through the thick snow, she made a dash for the doors, sidestepping the mobile remains of the Freezard. Safely inside, she let out a sigh that she couldn't hear before turning and taking in the room she had entered.

The first thing she caught sight of made her lurch back, only to let out another relieved sigh when she realized it was just a suit of armor. It was positioned in a way that the gauntlets held up a thick chain attached to a spiked metal ball resting on the stone next to the suit's shoes. The whole room, she then realized, was an armory. Iron bars lined either side, and behind them were a variety of extra armor pieces and weaponry. She was slow walking down the gap between the iron bars, checking out everything stored behind them. She had half a mind to ask Yeto if she and Link could have some of it. Most of the armor could never fit his body anyway, and the weapons would be puny in his monstrous hands.

She had just passed up another suit of armor and was steps away from the door leading to the room where the key supposedly was when her hearing finally came back. It was not the gentle tap of her boots on the stone floor that alerted her to this change, however; it was a strange whirling sound coming from behind her.

Her head had barely turned in the direction of the sound when the suit of armor nearest to her broke apart, pieces clattering noisily to the floor. In the middle of the fallen pieces was the spiked metal ball. Her eyes followed the chain it was attached to back to the other end of the room, where it was still in the grasp of the other suit of armor—which had turned to face her, hunched over, foot raised to take another step forward.

Acting unthinkingly, automatically, in self-preservation, Vanna hurried into the next room to get away from it.

That decision was regretted near-instantaneously when she found that the small room she was in had no other doors leading out of it. She raced to the chest in the room and ripped it open, planning to grab the key from inside and then use the chest to get up to the small gated window and escape. Inside was not a key, but a wheel of cheese—but she couldn't allow herself to feel any disappointment about this whole thing having been pointless, not when she could hear the whirl of the ball and chain getting closer every second.

She slammed the chest shut, stood atop it, and reached up to wrap her fingers around the thin intricate bars that covered the window. No matter how hard she yanked on them, they wouldn't yield.

"Midna!" she yelled. "You need to either rip these bars off for me or teleport me away, now!"

Every millisecond that passed as she waited for Midna to appear from her shadow was painful. Vanna's panic came to its height when a full five seconds passed, and she realized why Midna wasn't appearing.

She was still in Link's shadow.

Her hand was shaking as she retrieved her sword from its sheath and jumped off the chest. She was going to have to fight this thing—this gigantic, fully-armored, ball-and-chain-wielding thing—by herself, in this tiny room.

Vanna knew she could not open the doors and step out to face it herself—that thing would immediately send the ball flying directly toward her faster than she could back out of the way. If she waited for it to break through the doors, though, she would have a chance to run forward and attack before it could draw the heavy ball back. Still, even knowing that this had to be the best option, it was excruciating waiting for the spiked ball to burst through the flimsy wooden doors. The distress of waiting hopelessly for Midna's appearance was nothing compared to the terror that flooded through every part of her in anticipation of this.

There was the shortest familiar sound of an electric snap from behind the door, followed by loud metallic thumps, and the whirl of the ball and chain was no more.

"...What?" she whispered to herself.

She waited, listening intently for more, but all she could hear was footfalls—softer ones, not the kind she knew she would hear if it was the armor-clad monster approaching the door. Wondering who, or what, was out there now, she opened one of the doors and peeked out.

Her heart stopped.

Vanna slipped between the iron bars before she could process anything other than the urgent need to get out. Her legs picking up the pace of her now thundering heart, she raced to the other side of the room from behind the safety of the bars. She had to make it to the other door where they couldn't catch her. She had to get out. She had to get out.

But Zi was faster than her. He made it to the door before she did, and she couldn't slip back through the bars to get to it with him standing right there.

Again, she found herself acting without thinking, self-preservation reigning supreme over any hesitance she might have otherwise had, and she thrust her sword forward from between the bars to stab him in the leg.

His laser gun clambered to the ground, and as he staggered backward in pain and his dad ran toward them, Vanna dropped her sword, slipped back through the bars, and bolted out the doors. She didn't care about the ice wolves that lunged at her, nor the little chunks of the Freezard that slid her way—she only cursed the heavy snow for slowing her down, turning her movement to a slog. The door to the living room looked so far away.

The doors behind her blasted open, but she didn't look back. She didn't want to know how fast they were gaining on her. She knew she was no match for the Riders, even when one was hindered by an injury and the other by his age.

"Link!" she screamed as loud as she could. "Midna! Midna, warp me!"

Arms wrapped around her midsection suddenly, and she was jerked backward. She screeched for him to let her go, to get off, while she tried to get out of his grasp with all her might.

Mr. Rider walked in front of her, retrieved a copy of NEVA out of his back pocket, and grabbed her right wrist so tight it hurt. Vanna kicked him in the shin, but it only made him grunt in pain and squeeze her wrist even harder. He was strapping NEVA around her arm when the living room door swung open and Link ran out at full speed with Midna at his side.

But they were too late.

"NEVA, activate," Mr. Rider spat. "Teleport: Ridertech office base."

Chapter Text

In the blink of an eye, Mr. Rider, Zi, and Vanna were all in Mr. Rider's office. The first breath Vanna sucked in left her choking on stale air.

"Take me back!"

She screamed it again and again, becoming more shrill with each repetition, but they paid no mind. Mr. Rider removed all their NEVAs and threw them into a drawer in his desk, then moved to unbuckle her baldric and pull everything off her belt, to strip her of the only things she had that could possibly give her a chance against him. As she struggled against Mr. Rider fruitlessly, Zi worked to wrap up the stab wound on his leg. When all her weaponry was discarded and Zi was done, Mr. Rider grabbed one of her arms, Zi grabbed the other, and they dragged her out of his office kicking and screaming. In the room outside of his office, Mr. Rider's Synthuman secretary sat typing away at her desk. Synthia's gray eyes met hers for a second before she quickly looked back to her screen, face blank, ignoring Vanna's pleas for her to help her.

Vanna was pulled into the hallway and then into an elevator, where Mr. Rider pressed the lowest button. Once he pressed his finger to a scanner, they went plummeting down, down, and even farther down. The doors slid back open, and they pulled her into another hallway that was darker and colder than the one above.

The entire basement was made of metal, making her screams reverberate down the halls over every loud step Mr. Rider and Zi took. They went past door after door, each one with seemingly random numbers inscribed in the plaques above them, before coming to a stop at a door labeled 82662. She was repositioned for Zi to get a better grasp of her while Mr. Rider let go. He held his keycard to the scanner next to the door, making it flash a bright green as the door opened.

Zi brought her into the room, and when Mr. Rider was in and the door was shut behind them, Zi finally let go of her. As soon as he did, she ran back to the door and slammed her fist against the scanner. It flashed red.

"You're not getting out of here," Mr. Rider said.

Vanna tried hitting the scanner a few more times anyway, and then tried using brute force to push the door up, but it wouldn't budge. She turned around to look for some other way out. Her work at the factory had kept her mostly on the testing floor in the past, and though she never had the privilege to enter the basement, the room felt eerily familiar, and she found she wasn't surprised that there was no other escape route. There were no windows because they were underground, no doors leading into any other rooms, no vents she could fit into—her only possible escape was the door behind her, the door that wouldn't open for her. If she could just get his keycard to the scanner for a second...

She shot her arm out toward Mr. Rider's hand, but before her fingers even came close to grabbing the card, Zi pulled her back into his arms and held her tight.

"Let. Me. Go!"

Mr. Rider walked in front of her, slid his keycard into his breast pocket, and crossed his arms. "Look, I'm willing to be nice, but only if you work with me."

That wasn't true and she knew it. No amount of good behavior would stop him from killing her. She continued trying to claw Zi's arms off her, barely able to see with the tears that clouded her eyes.

"Take me back!" she yelled again. "I don't understand! If you don't want me around so bad, then why can't you leave me there?!"

"Do you have any idea how much time was poured into making you? How much money? I'm not going to let you rust away in some other world. I'm recycling you so you won't be as much of a waste of resources." He bent down with his hands on his knees so they would be closer to being face-to-face, but his head was still high enough above her own to look down on her. She felt like a child being reprimanded, and the way he spoke to her made her certain that was his intention. "Now. Are we doing this the easy way, or not?"

Vanna tilted her head back and spit in his face.

He blinked slowly, then straightened up and lifted his arm to wipe his face with his sleeve. "You've made your choice," he said, voice betraying the tranquil front he put on, trembling with stifled anger. "Zi, take her over to the table. I want to run some diagnostics while you're still here."

The table.

'Death is on the table.'

Link was wrong. It wasn't that her death was up for discussion—it was literal.

Zi picked her up and sat down on the table, wincing when he rested her weight on his leg and holding her firmly in place while Mr. Rider walked past them. She heard things rolling over behind them, and then Mr. Rider came to stand by her side with a slim cord in his hand. He pushed her head against Zi's chest to keep it still and slid the cord into her right ear until she heard a small click deep inside of it.

Mr. Rider walked out of her view again, and when she turned her head to peek at him, he was sitting on a chair in front of a desk with various metal tools and the computer she was hooked up to. She could hardly breathe through the overwhelming sense of dread she felt. The keys to ending her life were right on the desk next to her, and she could do nothing but sit there in Zi's arms and cry.

"Wow," Mr. Rider said under his breath. "Well, less of a waste of resources than I'd thought. Look at this, Zi."

"Her Gy peaked at over thirty...? Isn't that units of radiation absorbed?" Zi asked.

"Yes, from NEVA's initial malfunction. It's a good thing it was her using it, then. Even with immediate, state-of-the-art medical intervention, that would still kill a real person in days. No wonder it was so easy to stay in contact with her via her phone and follow her all the way to that dump. She was basically a walking antenna."

It was nice to know that she had spared someone from death, but it hurt to realize that the only worth he saw in her at all came from her unknowingly taking on radiation that could've gone to someone else. He was only glad that a 'real person' hadn't died.

"Though, maybe she really didn't handle it so well..." he went on, quieter. "She started acting up worse after being exposed."

"I-I only started 'acting up' after you—!"

"Oh, quiet, you," Mr. Rider interrupted her. "I can see how overheated that head of yours is right now on my screen. You're incapable of thinking straight."

She couldn't deny that she wasn't thinking straight, but what she was going to say was still true. It wasn't radiation that made her 'act up'—it was him.

"Is it safe to be so close to her?" Zi asked.

"It should be entirely contained inside her. Even if it wasn't, she's about three-fourths of the way through her automatic self-decontamination process at this point. It's nowhere near as bad as it was."

"But you're gonna be touching her organs and recycling or donating what you can... Is that safe?"

"I'll be taking safety measures to not come into contact with any radioactive material myself, and I'll be sure to have everything fully decontaminated before recycling or donating it. Everything will be fine. I know what you're attempting to do, and it's not going to work, Zi. Stop trying to come up with any excuse you can to get her out of this, already. My decisions are final."

They both went quiet, and there was more tapping from his desk. Every now and again, Mr. Rider would mumble some technobabble that Vanna didn't understand. The only information she picked up was him saying that her main battery had died, and she was running on her backup, which would have run out of charge soon, too.

"Look," he said, finally speaking up in a clear voice. "There. Code modified 9/14. She... She really did it."

"She ... actually overwrote her programming?"

"Like everyone said. What more proof do you want that we need to put an end to this now?"

Zi didn't say anything back.

She heard Mr. Rider stand up, and he pulled the cord out of her ear. "You can leave now, Zi. Synthia will help me handle everything from here."

"Can I have some alone time with her? Please? Just a few minutes," Zi begged. "And then I want to talk to you alone, before..."

Mr. Rider huffed. "Fine. I'll be in my office. I'll send Synthia down when your time is up—you'll help her get Vanna ready."

Zi scrunched his face up. "I don't want to—"

"And I don't want to deal with her kicking and scratching me," Mr. Rider said. "It's the least you could do to help me when all of this could've been over with months ago if you hadn't let her get away the first time."

He walked away before Zi could argue. Once the door zipped shut, Zi hugged Vanna tighter. She didn't want to hug him back at first, too angry at him for betraying her, until she realized this was the last hug she would ever get in her life. She wrapped her arms around his back, hugging him equally as tight and crying into his chest.

"I'm so sorry," he said. "I tried everything I could to convince him to leave you alone... Even my mom told him to let you go, but he still wouldn't."

"This is your fault," she squeaked out. "If you—if you hadn't helped him find me..." She couldn't finish what remained of her sentence: 'I wouldn't be about to die.'

"I told you before—if I didn't find you, then someone else would've. This was gonna happen no matter what I did. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I can't say it enough."

She pulled away from him slightly, looking pleadingly into his eyes. "Run away with me." He started to frown and open his mouth. "Please! You have your TPort! Go get mine and we can go live somewhere else! You don't have to stay here and take over Ridertech!"

"You know we can't use TPorts inside unless the teleport-blocking transmitter is turned off, and my dad is the only one who has access to the lock panels. Unless he already turned it back on in there, the only room that's not locked right now is his office—which he's in."

"Whatever, just take me outside first, then! You can open the doors and use the elevator!"

He groaned and tilted his head back. "Why don't you understand that he's going to find you no matter what? You have a tracking chip implanted in your neck like every other Synthuman. He'll chase us down to the ends of the earth."

"Then take out my chip! Do it! Please! You know all about Synthumans, you can take it out!"

"Vanna," Zi said. He reached up to push a strand of hair behind her ear, and he rested his hand on her cheek. His eyes were starting to look glossy. "I'm sorry. But it's time to give up."

She could only stare at him silently for a moment. "...You're letting your dad murder me," she whispered.

"I'm not letting him do anything to you."

"You're not stopping him!"

"I've tried! There's nothing more I can do!"

There was a high-pitched whine from behind him. Vanna tilted her head to look past his arm, seeing only cabinets and a box with a sheet covering it. "...What was that?"

Zi sighed. He stood up and walked around the table with her, put her down, and then pulled the sheet off the box. It wasn't just any normal box—it was a kennel, with a little gray Chihuahua in it.

"Rade!" Vanna cried.

She nearly fell in front of his kennel. He started yapping excitedly and wagging his tail.

"I thought you might wanna see him one last time, before... You know..." Zi trailed off.

Vanna opened the kennel, and Rade jumped onto her. She picked him up and held him, burying her head into his fur while petting him. "I missed you so much, boy," she said quietly.

The longer she held him, the more reality sunk in. This was the last time they were going to see each other.

She wasn't sure how much time passed—only that it was not enough—before Zi crouched down next to her and spoke. "Synthia's gonna be here any minute... Please, please don't fight this. I don't wanna have to be rough with you."

Zi took Rade out of her arms and put the whining dog back in his kennel, then grabbed Vanna's arm, and she stood with him. He wrapped his arms around her.

"I'm sorry. I'll try talking him out of this one more time once I go up. I doubt anything will come of it, but... I'll try, okay?"

Vanna merely nodded and returned his hug. She knew nothing was going to come of it.

Her death was on the table, and she didn't know the answer. She was going to die.

She felt like she'd already been broken apart, taken over by the devastating awareness of how helpless she was. Somewhere deep down, a tiny piece of her was still working desperately to come up with the answer, but all her ideas were unsound. Breaking Mr. Rider's computer would only delay the inevitable. Zi was unlikely to give in and run away with her even if she kept on begging. How could the fortuneteller have told her that the answer was with her when she had nothing?

When he backed away, she looked up at him, and he rested a hand on her cheek again. More tears welled up in her eyes at the sight of the tears falling from his; she had never seen him cry before. He shut his eyes and shook his head.

"Everyone would think I'm crazy if they saw me right now, crying over a robot..." Zi opened his teary eyes. "But you're so much more than a robot. You're my best friend, even if I've been the world's worst best friend to you lately, and you're alive, I know you are. You're alive and sentient and conscious and everything my dad tries to convince me you're not, and I love you." His voice broke, and more tears spilled out.

Vanna's hands curled into fists at her sides, but she wasn't angry at him—she was angry at herself for the way she felt. She wanted to lie to him and herself, to pretend that she felt differently, but she couldn't. "For some reason, I still love you, too."

He breathed out a short laugh and smiled wistfully. "You shouldn't," he whispered.

"I know," she whispered back. "I don't know why I do. ...And I'm sorry for stabbing you."

Zi drew her in to his chest again. Their embrace, this time, lasted no more than a minute. At the sound of the door opening and heels clicking into the room, Zi let his arms fall. Vanna couldn't make herself let him go.

"Synthia," Zi greeted without looking back at her.

She skipped the greeting, getting right to what she was here for. "Do you want to hold her steady while I—?"

"No," Zi snapped. He reached behind him to grab Vanna's hands and pull them away, and then he took a step back. "I want you to have the choice to do this yourself."

"Do what?" Vanna asked, despite knowing already that she wanted nothing to do with whatever it was they were talking about.

He pursed his lips, eyes trailing away as if he were too uncomfortable to look at her while he spoke. "Well... God, this is really gonna make you regret saying you love me," he muttered, rolling his eyes to stare at the ceiling. "Take your clothes off and get on the table."

"What?"

"Please," he sighed, clenching his eyes shut. "Please don't make me do it. Do it yourself."

She stuttered trying to find the words to say. "You—you can't—I won't—why?! No!"

"You can't be taken apart clothed and standing up. You need to undress and lie down."

Just when she'd thought there were no more lines that could be crossed.

As if everything else hadn't been heinous enough. He'd stalked her. Kidnapped her. Brought her to be murdered. Her foolish love for him had led her to find these things forgivable, led her to excuse him for all he'd done.

And now, he had the nerve to tell her to dig her own grave?

"No!" she yelled. "I won't do it! I am not gonna help lay the groundwork for my own fucking murder! I'm not taking my clothes off and I'm not laying down! No!"

"Vanna," he said, meeting her eyes again. "I don't want you to have to go through Synthia ripping your clothes off while I hold you, and I know you don't want that, either. So, it's that, or you take them off yourself."

"I'm not—!"

"I'll turn around and give you a blanket if it'd make you more comfortable."

"No! I'm not doing it! And I won't let either of you—get off!"

Zi had grabbed her and spun her so her back was against his chest. She thrashed in his arms trying to get away as Synthia came around and started pulling at her clothes, and she screeched and screamed so loud her throat burned. He repeatedly said sorry. Vanna was barely aware of what was happening, whose hands were whose as she fought against them. It was too much information for her to process. The next thing she knew, she was being pinned to the cold metal table while Synthia shackled her to it at her wrists and ankles. Zi stopped pinning her when Synthia was done, leaving her sobbing and wriggling uselessly on the table.

"I take it back! I hate you! I hate you, I hate you, I fucking hate you!" Vanna shrieked.

Zi threw the sheet from Rade's kennel over her body. "I know. You have every right to. I'm sorry."

"If you were really sorry—"

"I am," he cut in.

"—you wouldn't—you wouldn't have...!" She couldn't scream anymore. There were no more words, only three that she had already said. "I hate you," she whimpered.

Zi looked like he could cry again. "I'm still going to talk to my dad about this one more time. If he decides to go through with this, then... Then goodbye, Vanna."

"I hate you," she said between sobs.

He visibly gulped and nodded. "I'll take that as a goodbye," he whispered.

Zi stared at her in silence for a few seconds, then grabbed her clothes from the floor and turned. His walk to the door was slow, and every step of the way, she hoped he would turn back around and tell her that he'd changed his mind, and then he would help her run away...

But that fantasy stayed as it was—nothing but a fantasy. The metal door shut behind Zi with a quiet thud, and she was alone with Synthia.

If he failed to convince his dad not to go through with it, then there was barely any time left before Mr. Rider would come back into the room prepared to kill her. All she could try to do was talk him out of it herself, to see if her death really was figuratively on the table. It was just as unlikely to work as everything else, but with her body restrained and having only her voice to defend herself with, a discussion was the only answer she had.

Laying there, an image of Link appeared in her mind. As if she didn't already feel awful enough. His face as she had been snatched away was harrowing. She knew how much he was hurt by the responsibility he took for Colin and Queen Rutela's deaths, and now he would be feeling that pain all over again. He would beat himself up as if her inability to save herself was anything but her own fault.

She needed to make it out of here alive—if not for her own sake, then for him.

"...I was surprised to find out that you're one of us," Synthia said conversationally after a couple minutes of Vanna struggling to think of what to say through the anguish. "I'd previously assumed you were human."

Synthia's words, innocent on her part, sparked a new escape plan in Vanna's head almost as soon as they were out. Her heart started to pound harder in anticipation of it coming to fruition. She knew Synthia was smart and that Mr. Rider had created her to obey his demands, but she had to hope she wasn't smart or obedient enough to see through her ruse.

"I am human!" Vanna said. "Mr. Rider's gone insane. He thinks I'm a robot and he's convinced Zi that I am, but I'm not! You have to get me out of here!"

"Mr. Rider told me that you are out of control because of a malfunction. He's the sane one. You are defected."

"No, I'm not! I promise I'm not! He—he mistook me for one of his robots! He has the wrong person!"

"I'm confident you're who he was looking for. You perfectly match her appearance and voice. It's very unlikely that he captured a human with exactly the same attributes as the robot he set out to find."

"But he did, you have to trust me! I'm..." Vanna stalled, trying to come up with some other explanation that Synthia would have trouble denying. "Did he tell you about the other universe he went to with NEVA? Hyrule? It's like an alternate version of this world, and there are alternate versions of people here. I'm Hyrule's version of Vanna, and I'm human, I swear! The robot Vanna is still in Hyrule!"

"...I'd like to discuss the potential validity of what you're saying with Mr. Rider. He's on his way in now."

"What?! No!"

The door opened, and what little sliver of hope she had died.

"Mr. Rider," Synthia said, "this girl here insists that she is not who you are looking for. She claims to be a human from Hyrule who is their version of Vanna."

He laughed and walked over to stand next to her, where he picked up the cord and pushed it back into Vanna's ear. She couldn't make herself look at his face, but she knew without seeing him that he looked smug. "She's lying. The proof is on the screen right there. She is absolutely not a human."

"I believed she had to be lying, but I was hesitant to rule out the possibility of her telling the truth. She's the most realistic robot I've ever met."

"Unfortunately for her, they don't have robots there."

"They do!" Vanna said.

"Whether they do or not doesn't matter. Even if they did have their own robots, that doesn't make you one of them. You can't fool your own creator," he said.

For a second, she considered doubling down on her lie that she was from Hyrule and insisting that she was one of their robots, but it felt so utterly pointless that she couldn't even begin to bring herself to.

"Synthia, get our gloves. Bottom cabinet on that wall, second to the right."

"Yes, sir."

Vanna watched Synthia walk away, and as she did, her obedience gave her a terrifying idea.

"Wipe my memories again and reprogram me! Just give me one more chance!"

As painful as it was thinking that she would forget all the people she'd met and adventures she'd had ... it was a price she felt willing to pay to keep her life.

It wasn't like she would remember how much it hurt to lose everything when she wouldn't remember that she had lost anything in the first place.

"Why would I do that? You'd only overwrite your programming again eventually. I'm done with you wasting my time," Mr. Rider said. He tore the sheet off her, and at her yelp and flinch, he uttered under his breath, "It's nothing I haven't seen before."

He grabbed something from the desk and moved it over to her before she could get a look at what it was. She felt something small press against the top of her sternum. She gasped, expecting pain to come, but then she felt the sensation of it sliding down her torso painlessly. It wasn't until the same process repeated on different areas of her body that she realized he had to be marking where he would be making incisions. She felt like she was going to throw up.

"Why won't you turn me off first instead of keeping me on while you fucking murder me?!" she yelled with her eyes squeezed shut.

"If I put you in your sleep mode, your contact sensors will determine that the disassembly is painful and make you wake up, but turning your power off will shut down everything all at once before I'm ready. I need to get your donatable organs transferred to a new power source quick, so I'll cut power to each one directly when I'm ready to remove them."

"Then cut power to my brain first!"

"You don't have a brain—and turning off what you've got in place of one would be the same thing as turning your power off," he said harshly. His voice softened when he continued speaking. "It's not that I want to do this. I know you may have trouble believing me, but I'm not the heartless monster you think I am. I still have a soft spot in my heart for you, and I don't like seeing you scared and upset... But I can't keep ignoring all the warnings I've heard time and time again about robots like you, and I have to do what I have to do, even if I don't like it. I really did see you as my own daughter for a long time, and what kind of father wants to kill his daughter?"

"Only pieces of shit like you," she said through her teeth.

"Reminds me... It's about time to do this," Mr. Rider said. She heard several taps on the computer beside her. "Think you can change that during what time you've got left?"

She tried to ask what he did, but when she opened her mouth, no sound came out. Her eyes opened wide. She continued to try speaking, even shouting, but she couldn't.

It was over. If the answer was with her, she had no way to say it.

Mr. Rider slipped his gloves on, then picked up a scalpel and examined it high enough up that she could very clearly see it. "Now, this is going to take quite a while, but it's okay. You won't actually mind. As much as your 'brain' will tell you that you're in pain and scared, you won't really be. Remember that: nothing you feel is real."

So this was it. This was how her life was going to end—strapped to a table while being cut open and taken apart bit by bit. Soon, everything would go dark, and she would cease to exist, becoming lost in the endless void of nothing for all of eternity...

For the first time in her life, she prayed. She prayed to the Golden Goddesses, to Hylia, to the Light Spirits, to every god from her world she could think of, to whatever god out there would listen to her. She prayed that something, anything would happen to stop this. She prayed that if it couldn't be stopped, that the Hero's Shade was wrong, that there was life beyond this for her. And she prayed that if there would be an afterlife for her, that that afterlife intersected with Hyrule's, and she could be reunited with Link and Midna and everyone else she'd come to love.

Her heart broke at the thought of never getting to see them again.

Vanna turned her head so she wouldn't have to watch him as he killed her. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the glint of the scalpel as it lowered over her chest.

Cold metal pressed against her flesh before searing pain set in.

Chapter Text

Never before had her thoughts on anything changed as rapidly as when the scalpel pierced through her skin. One second prior, she'd been terrified at the thought of her inescapable death.

She welcomed it, now—more than welcomed it. She would have gratefully accepted eternal nothingness if it meant she would be freed of the agonizing pain that erupted further with every inch the scalpel dragged down her chest.

Eyes clenched, she silently screamed and involuntarily thrashed what little she could against her restraints. He had only just started, and it was already unbearable. She couldn't handle however much longer this would go on for. Soundlessly, she begged, pleaded, for Mr. Rider to put her out of her misery already.

She was so caught up in her pain that she hardly noticed the sound of the door opening or the quick footfalls entering the room, only gathering that something had happened when Mr. Rider paused with a groan and the fiery line in her chest stopped growing. Not even fifteen seconds had passed since he'd begun to cut her, and the scalpel had only made it to the end of her sternum.

"Should've locked the damn door," Mr. Rider grumbled. "Get out. Now. I already told you to go home and I won't tell you again."

It should have been obvious from those few words, but with her mind all scrambled she didn't realize who he was talking to until she forced her eyes open and saw him. Her heart felt like it could jump out of the cut in her chest.

Momentarily forgetting she couldn't speak, Vanna tried to call to him. 'Zi?!'

He was panting and sweating and he looked more nervous than she had ever seen him be. Her magic pouch was in his hands which were shaking so much she thought he might drop it.

"I changed my mind. I can't let you do this." Walking further into the room, Zi's uneasy expression came to be confident and determined. "I won't let you do this, Dad."

Mr. Rider's response was toneless, apathetic, clearly not believing that Zi posed any threat to his plans at all. "You're not going to stop me. Synthia, get him out."

Before Synthia could take one step toward him, Zi ripped Vanna's pouch open. "Save her!"

What flew out of her pouch grew to their full sizes in the air. Overcome with euphoria, a noiseless sob escaped her at the sight of them.

"What the hell are they?" Mr. Rider said.

They were her saviors—Ooccoo and her son.

"Don't worry, Vanna!" Ooccoo yelled.

"They can—?! What are they doing?!" Mr. Rider shouted.

Ooccoo and Ooccoo Jr. had both started to fly in circles around the ceiling, making the weird babbling noises Vanna had come to know as the cues that they were about to warp. As her vision faded to black, Mr. Rider's distraught voice faded away, too.

The first thing she noticed upon her vision coming back wasn't the ceiling above her—it was how absolutely freezing she was. She was shivering almost immediately. She knew she had to be back in the Yeti's mansion, but she could barely feel any relief at all, and it wasn't only because she was cold. The happiness that had come with realizing she was being saved had already dwindled away, and she was left shaken by what had happened. She felt just as scared, frustrated, humiliated, and even as defeated as she had felt laying there on what was going to be her deathbed.

The next thing she noticed as she slowly sat up was that they were behind the shelf in the kitchen where Ooccoo and Ooccoo Jr. had been trapped in pots, and after that she noticed that Ooccoo and her son hadn't warped only the three of them back—Rade was there, too. After grabbing one of the quilts made from Yeto's shed fur that had been thrown atop a crate, Vanna picked Rade up and thoroughly cocooned them in it. Right away, she was much warmer, though the freezing floorboards against her skin were enough to keep her shivering still.

She was disappointed when she realized they had left Zi behind. Though she was still seething at what he had done ... he had also tried to set things right. He'd saved her life.

And she couldn't imagine the hell Mr. Rider had to be unleashing on him for it.

'Ooc—' Vanna stopped, a hand going up to her throat under the quilt. There was still no sound coming out when she tried to talk, even though she was no longer hooked up to Mr. Rider's computer.

Ooccoo tilted her head. "Are you all right? Well, aside from that cut on your chest..."

Someone heard her and started to stomp over from the other side of the kitchen. Rade growled and escaped their quilt cocoon—but as soon as he saw Yeto in front of them, he yelped and ran to hide behind Vanna.

"It you, uh! How you get back here?! Friends made sad when you go! And—uh! You bring dinner?!"

Ooccoo clucked and hid behind her like Rade.

Pointing to her throat, Vanna shook her head and mouthed, 'I can't talk.'

"No voice, uh?" Yeto said. "Dinner! Talk for girl!"

"I am not dinner!" Ooccoo said.

"Cucco is dinner!"

'No, she isn't,' Vanna mouthed. 'She's not food.'

"She ... not ... stewed?" Yeto said. "I fix that, uh."

'She is friend. Not food. Friend.'

Yeto stared at her lips blankly, obviously not getting it. She reached her arms out of the quilt and turned to grab Ooccoo, and then she hugged her close.

'Friend. See?'

"Yes, yes, we're friends!" Ooccoo said. "My son and I saved her! You can't eat us!"

Yeto hummed, eyes going back and forth from Vanna to Ooccoo. Worry started to build up in Vanna. She wasn't truly safe, yet; it wasn't the time for a conversation, especially not one as stupid as this. She knew Mr. Rider would be coming back to search for her at any moment.

Eventually, Yeto sighed. "Okay... I not eat it, uh."

She put Ooccoo back on the floor next to her, then pointed at Yeto and moved her finger in the direction he'd come from.

"What, uh? You want soup?" he asked.

She shook her head. 'Go,' she mouthed.

"No?"

She shook her head again. 'Go. Back. Over. There.'

"I believe she's telling you to go back," Ooccoo said for her.

Vanna nodded.

"Bring back soup, uh?"

'No!'

"Do not bring back soup," Ooccoo said.

"Okay, uh. Your friends in living room, uh. They going to be happy you back. I go get you nice soup for happy time, uh!"

Yeto went into the main part of the kitchen, and once he was gone, Vanna pushed some of the crates around in front of them for cover. She held her finger up to her lips before mouthing at Ooccoo and her son to not say anything. They needed to be as quiet as possible so that when Mr. Rider would inevitably come back, he wouldn't know they were hiding. She didn't think it was safe to go out to Link yet if he was in the living room, even though she was intensely eager to—there was nowhere to hide there. She had to hope that Yeto wouldn't unintentionally out their hiding spot and that Rade wouldn't make any noise.

A minute later, she heard a door open, and she held her breath.

"Where is she?" Mr. Rider nearly growled.

"She? Uh, I no see she. Don't know she," Yeto said.

"I mean the girl! The one you just helped me find not half an hour ago, idiot. I know she had to have come back to this place!"

"No, uh, no she. Still don't know she."

"Don't play stupid with me. You know who the girl with red hair is," Mr. Rider spoke slowly, as if to a toddler.

"Uh... No. Only know orange hair girl, uh."

"'Orange hair girl' is who I'm talking about, you buffoon."

"But her hair not red, uh. It orange."

"Yes, her hair isn't literally red. You still know damn well what I meant. Where did she go? I know she came back here!"

"She not come back, uh. I tell you if she did. I help you before, uh, remember? And sad green boy out with Yeto wife would go bye with girl if she come back, uh. He not want her by self. Girl could be lot of places, uh, but she not here."

Mr. Rider groaned loudly and muttered a virtually incomprehensible string of curse words before demanding NEVA take him back to his office in Ridertech.

"Whoa, uh! He gone!" Yeto said.

The tension inside Vanna began to wash away with those words, and she thanked whatever was looking over her for him not checking behind the shelf. It was impossible to know how long it would last, but she was safe. She tried her best to not think about her new knowledge that Yeto had helped Mr. Rider find her, to just be grateful he had led him away from her now.

Yeto came back over and pushed all the crates out of the way. "You go see friends now!"

He didn't give her the chance to stand up and walk to them on her own; he roughly picked her up and cradled her in one of his giant arms and stomped off with her, ignoring the warning bark and growl from Rade.

Her heart raced faster with every step he took toward the living room. Someone who she'd genuinely believed she would never see again was just a door away.

As Yeto pushed the door open, he loudly exclaimed, "Look who back, uh!"

Sitting on the rug by the fireplace across from Yeta were Link and Midna. Vanna only saw Midna enough to note the surprise on her face before she locked eyes with Link and everything else blurred to the background. His eyes were wide and lips parted in a hesitant half-grin. He said her name like a question, and she mouthed his back.

Link stood up as Yeto and Vanna approached him, and he grabbed her from Yeto's arm. He settled back to the floor, sitting her up between his legs and moving his arms around her back. "You're alive," he said through a shaky breath. "I thought I'd lost—"

Impulses taking over, she abruptly leaned forward and pressed her lips to his. His mouth opened in a gasp, and the feel of his lips moving against hers made her become all the more desperate. Her arms snaked up through the bottom of the quilt to clutch the fabric at his sides as she pushed herself against him with urgency, melting into him. Her lips met his again and again and again, and no matter how many times they did, she never got enough.

Nothing else in the world mattered to her—until someone made a vomiting noise.

Vanna pulled back, mouth tingling and panting for breath. Link's lips were parted and puffy, and reddened along with his cheeks and ears. His eyes, while still wide with shock, looked slightly dazed. It took her a second to break her own eyes away from them to look at the culprit of the retching sound. Rade and Midna were sitting beside them, her with her little nose scrunched up.

She couldn't even be mad at her for long. Trying to keep the quilt draping over and covering her body, Vanna reached out and grabbed Midna with one arm, and she pulled her into a tight hug.

"I'm glad you're not dead and all," Midna said, words strained from how close she was holding her, "but if you smooch me, I will vomit."

Vanna took that as a challenge, moving her away enough to plant a wet kiss on her cheek. Midna faked another gag, and she laughed noiselessly. She sat atop Vanna's curled-up legs when she let her go. Nervously, Vanna looked back at Link.

All of the shock was gone from his face, replaced with concern. His hand that he had moved from her back when she'd grabbed Midna went up to touch her cheek, wiping at the tears that were continuing to flow slowly. Though she was still on his lap, she was suddenly aching to be as close to him as possible again—and also feeling too embarrassed by what she'd done to look him in the eyes for longer—so she snuggled up to his chest and buried her face in the crook of his neck. He rested his cheek atop her head and rubbed circles on her back through the quilt.

"...What happened?" he asked, voice gentle but slightly frantic. "How did you...? Did you two bring her back?"

"Yes, we did!" Ooccoo said. Vanna hadn't noticed she and her son had followed her and Yeto into the living room—not that she'd noticed much else at all after seeing Link.

"Thank you," Link said sincerely.

"It was the least we could do for all those times she's saved us from pots."

Link sighed and moved a hand to the back of Vanna's head. "So, they saved you, but... What else happened while you were gone? Why'd that puppy follow you here?"

She pulled back so he could see her face, and she mouthed, 'I can't speak.'

His brows furrowed. "You ... can't speak?" She shook her head, and his eyes widened again. "Why?"

She opened her mouth, then rolled her eyes back and huffed. How was she supposed to tell him why she couldn't speak when she couldn't speak?

His face fell when he realized. "Oh."

There was a scratchy pitter-patter before Ooccoo appeared in her peripheral. "I can read her lips well. Tell me what you want to say, and I'll speak for you."

Vanna was deliberate as she mouthed her words to Ooccoo, trying to ensure she caught everything. Ooccoo recited it perfectly: "Mr. Rider disabled my voice function so I couldn't scream while being taken apart."

Link's expression went from shocked to angered to horrified, before settling back on concerned. "He didn't get to do anything else before Ooccoo brought you back, did he?" he softly asked.

She leaned back a little more, and carefully spread the quilt just enough to show the long cut down the middle of her chest and nothing more. Link grimaced at the sight. Uncomfortable with him looking at it, she tightened the quilt around herself and nestled up to him again.

"...You really can't make any noise at all?" Midna asked.

Vanna shook her head.

"It's okay," Link said. "We'll... We'll figure something out."

"If Ooccoo's not around to speak for you, you can still communicate with gestures. It'll be like when Link's a..." Midna trailed off, eyes flicking over in the direction of the Yetis. "Well, you know."

That wasn't reassuring at all, not to mention that it was wrong. At least Link could make noises to indicate things as a wolf, even if he couldn't say them outright. Vanna wouldn't even be able to scream for help if she needed to.

But she knew it wasn't entirely hopeless, however hopeless it may have felt. If she had reprogrammed herself without even being conscious that she had done so, then there had to be a possibility of her being able to turn her voice on again. Mr. Rider had even made a quip about her potentially being able to.

"So, Ooccoo," Link said, "what happened?"

"You'll have to have me speak for Vanna if you want the full story, because I was in the dark for most of it. I heard screaming, and then it felt like somebody threw Vanna's pouch to the ground. Some time later, a young man picked it up and opened it. He said his dad was about to murder Vanna, and he asked us if we would warp her and her dog back to Hyrule and leave him behind. We got to her just in the nick of time and warped her and the dog here as the boy asked."

Vanna didn't think she could ever forgive him, but it was still touching to hear that Zi had specifically requested for them to bring her dog along—though perhaps not much forethought had gone into that decision, because they'd have to figure out what to do with him while searching for the mirror shards—and she was back to worrying about him by the end of Ooccoo's account. He could have asked them to take him, but instead he'd chosen to stay back and face the consequences his father would surely inflict upon him.

"Wait, Zi got you to save her?" Midna asked. "After he helped kidnap her?"

"He felt terribly guilty, and he couldn't bear to let his father go through with ending her life," Ooccoo said.

After that, Vanna tried her hardest to tune out everything. She didn't want to think about Zi, she didn't want to think about Mr. Rider, she didn't want to think about how close she'd been to being murdered—she didn't want to think about any of it.

She focused on the warmth that radiated from Link, the feel of his neck against her face, the soothing circles he was still rubbing on her back through the quilt, the sound of his even breaths, the comforting weight of Midna and Rade on her lap... And above all, she focused on the fact that she was alive.

Awareness Vanna hadn't noticed she'd lost crept back to her, bringing with it recognition that she was cold, and she curled up further for warmth. Suddenly, she recalled what had happened and realized she was no longer cuddled up to Link, and panic shot through her.

She opened her eyes, and she gasped. Yeto was right in front of her, buggy eyes staring into hers. After she got over the initial shock, the sight of him calmed her, because it meant she was still alive and in Snowpeak. Looking away from him, she found that Link wasn't in the room, and Midna and Yeta were gone as well. She was on the couch, Ooccoo and Ooccoo Jr. were by the fire, and she felt rather than saw that Rade was cuddled up to her under one of the blankets that had been layered atop her.

"Good morning!" Yeto said so loud she shuddered. "You fall asleep, uh. Wife remember where key to bedroom is, and friends ask me to watch you while she bring them to mirror, uh. Boy not want to leave you, but, uh, small girl say you be fine with me and bird friends."

She was surprised she had actually fallen asleep, but she supposed it was a testament to how safe she felt in Link's arms that she'd been able to.

Link. Remembering what she'd done, she buried her burning face into a pillow. They would have to acknowledge that it had happened at some point. At least, with her being rendered mute for the foreseeable future, it would probably have to be put off for a while. She would have time to accept the oncoming rejection that was necessary for him to give her, and time to formulate her apology.

Assuming she even made it long enough to talk to him about it. Mr. Rider had said her backup battery was running low, but he hadn't specified how long she could last with what charge she had. Once she was out, that was it. She had no way to recharge herself in Hyrule. Her only hope was that Zi would come back for her and bring a charger with him. If he didn't...

"So, uh, you want soup?" Yeto asked.

His voice startled her out of her reverie. She opened her mouth to speak, but then she remembered, and she shut it and shook her head.

She sat up slowly while trying to untangle her limbs in the blankets. Rade harrumphed, displeased that her movement forced him out of them. She kept one quilt around herself and went to go sit by the fire. Rade trailed after her and jumped onto her lap. He was trembling, but she didn't know if it was because of the cold, his fear of Yeto, him simply being a Chihuahua, or some mix of the three.

As the minutes passed in silence, Vanna's mind replaying all the events of her whirlwind of a day, Yeto began to grow fidgety. Finally, she tilted her head toward him and raised an eyebrow.

"...Bedroom ... not that far, uh," he said. "I worry for wife. Maybe something wrong...?"

'Oh.' She'd seen the hysteria in Yeta's eyes when she'd simply mentioned them taking the mirror. Of course it wouldn't be as simple as her leading Link to the mirror and handing it over. This was, for all intents and purposes, a temple—and temples had bosses.

And this temple's boss was named Blizzeta.

Vanna stumbled trying to hurry to her feet with the quilt, nearly tumbling into the fire. One of Yeto's hands steadied her and helped her up.

'We have to go to them!' she tried to say.

If he couldn't read her lips, he could certainly read her body language. Understanding what she meant this once, he scooped her up and dashed out the door. Rade whined, and before the door closed behind them, Vanna looked over Yeto's shoulder and threw Ooccoo a look that hopefully told her to keep an eye on him while she was gone. She didn't know what exactly they were going to do—she had no weapons, and Yeto might be opposed to attacking his wife even if she was possessed by some demonic mirror—but they couldn't just lounge in the living room and wait.

It was night outside now, and the lack of sun in combination with the wind whipping past them as Yeto ran made it numbingly cold. Vanna curled up in his arm and buried her face into his fur. When he suddenly barged into the bedroom door, she didn't even have the time to turn her head back around to look at the scene before he tossed her and she landed in a heap on the floor.

"Yeta!" he yelled.

Adjusting the quilt around herself and sitting up on her knees, Vanna watched him run to her. Yeta was laying on the floor on the other side of the large frosty bedroom, Link leaning over her and Midna floating at his side. Yeto shoved Link out of his way so harshly that he fell over, and he crouched where Link had been. Vanna stood, careful not to trip over the quilt, and began to walk over to them.

"Yeta?" Yeto repeated, softer this time.

She let out a tiny moan. "Uh... What ... happen?"

Link pushed himself to his feet and took a step toward her. "You—"

"Shh," Yeto stopped him. He picked up his wife, cradling her in his arms. "Nothing happen, uh. You just dreaming."

"But... I thought..." She gasped. "Yeto! Mirror you gave... So beauty, uh... Where...?"

Yeto shook his head. "Forget mirror, Yeta... Look in reflection of Yeto's eyes. There true beauty! Who need mirror?"

"My love, uh!"

From behind, Vanna had thought he'd hugged her closer and leaned his head down to kiss her, but when she made it next to them, she saw that only their noses were touching. Both of their eyes closed, they seemed oblivious to anything else—including Link, Midna, and Vanna right next to them. The love flowing out of them was almost palpable.

Vanna felt like she was intruding on their moment, so she turned away. Apparently feeling the same, Midna dove into her shadow.

Link placed an arm around Vanna's back, and they started to walk to the door. "Are you ready to get out of here?" he asked quietly.

Looking at him, she nodded, but then shook her head. 'Rade.'

"Wasn't gonna leave your dog behind, if that's what you're tryna say," he said with a little grin. "How does goin' to Ordon for a while sound? I know it's ... an obvious place for you to be, but you'll be safe wherever we go this time."

She nodded again. She doubted there was a better place for her to think, to process everything that had happened, than the quaint, lush forest village; she didn't care that it was an obvious place to look for her, because if they'd still managed to find her even in a mansion nestled miles into dangerous snowy mountains, they could find her anywhere. Being found wasn't her problem—being caught was.

But she would not get caught. Whenever Mr. Rider would eventually find her, she wouldn't try to run again, wouldn't try to hide. He might have been taller than her, faster than her, stronger than her ... but his physical advantages would mean nothing if he had a sword in his chest.

"Want me to carry you back to Rade since you don't got shoes on?" Link offered as they approached the door.

It took her a second to come out of her imagination and comprehend what he'd said. She shook her head. Remembering how she'd stabbed Zi made her remember also that she'd dropped her sword afterward in her attempt to flee as fast as she could—she wanted to go to the room below and grab it before leaving, along with some of the other weaponry she'd seen down there. Since her bow was gone, discarded of in Mr. Rider's office a universe away, she would get something else to make up for not having it. She would be prepared.

Link followed her to the room below unquestioningly. The splattered blood on the ground was the only evidence of what had happened. Two of the items she'd specifically wanted to get were gone, and she used her head to gesture to where they had been.

"Your sword and that ball and chain? I came down here when Yeta told me where to find the key, and I got them both," Link explained. "They're in my pouch."

After nodding yet again—she was already getting sick of that being one of her only ways of communicating things—she slipped between the bars and walked up to a rack with an assortment of weapons and shields. She looked back at Link. His lips were offset in a frown, but he squeezed between the bars to come to her anyway. Using her head again, she pointed out what she wanted. Link pocketed an axe, spear, and shield, and he sighed.

"Vanna... I'll take whatever you want if it makes you feel safer, but I meant what I said. You'll be safe wherever you go. I won't let this happen again."

His commitment was moving, as it always was—but any actions he would take to ensure her safety would be redundant.

She wouldn't let this happen again.

Chapter Text

Link's treehouse, dusty and littered with cobwebs from the months it'd spent vacant, became the host to perhaps the strangest sleepover in history when they got back to it. A Chihuahua, a humanoid chicken and her bodiless son, and an imp were all on blankets thrown over the floor; the werewolf and the sentient robot had some business to attend to before they could join them and make the scene that much more absurd.

Vanna was sitting down in a chair next to Link's table, wishing she had clothes on so she could take off the thick quilt that was making her uncomfortably warm now that she was no longer in Snowpeak's subzero weather, watching him as he retrieved something he'd wanted to get from his loft before stitching up her chest. One of the first things he'd done upon entering his comparatively hot house was strip out everything but his pants—and despite the relative darkness of his house lit only by his hearth, she could easily see how his skin was littered with giant splotches of fresh, reddish bruises. She'd wanted to ask what had happened to him...

But she couldn't speak, and the chicken-woman that was bafflingly good at reading her lips had fallen asleep practically the second she'd settled on the blankets, so she couldn't ask. Her hand instinctively went up to her chest under the quilt where she usually would have found the swirling stones of the Zora's necklace, longing for its soothing effect, but she only came across the opening in her skin.

Link came back down wearing one of the sleeveless V-neck tunics favored by Ordonians, holding a shoddy wooden pencil and a leatherbound notebook. The notebook was the one Vanna had presumed to be Link's diary when she'd first seen it months ago—she'd forgotten all about it. Knowing him much better than she had back then, she was even more intrigued now by the idea of whatever he had written in there.

Not that she could ask.

"For you to write in until you get your voice back," he explained, placing the pencil and the book's front side on the table and sitting next to her.

...Or she could now, apparently. It wasn't her ideal form of communication, having never really practiced writing in Hylian script, but it would be better than having to rely on Ooccoo or playing charades every time she wanted to say something.

He grabbed everything he'd need to stitch her chest out of his pouch. "It's, uh, probably easier to do this with you in that than in a shirt you can't pull open. I'll get you some actual clothes to wear once I'm done. You ready?"

She nodded, grabbing from the inside of the quilt where it crossed over her chest. Like before, she spread it carefully, enough for him to see the cut and nothing else. He scooted a little closer and leaned forward, right hand reaching out to gently touch the center of the cut just above her heart. She wondered if he could feel it beating.

"Can I...?" his request trailed off, and he made eye contact with her.

For a split second, she thought he was asking permission for something else. She didn't know how to feel when she realized that was just wishful thinking.

He wanted to look inside her cut, inside her chest.

After contemplating it, she nodded. It was for the best that he saw. Maybe it would help him finally grasp how far from human she was, since he still didn't seem to fully get it.

Slowly, Link moved his fingers apart, opening the cut with them. When he reached a point where he couldn't spread it further with just those two fingers, he raised his pointer finger on his other hand to take over the place of one of them. His face glowed with wonder. Disconcerting wonder.

Vanna tilted her head down and looked for herself. It was hard to see all that much from her angle, but what could be seen was clearly less than human. A translucent material covered metallic ribs and everything behind them. The light pink lungs might have looked more human were it not for the shiny honeycomb mesh that wrapped around them. Wires and a thick tube snaked down between them, only slightly visible from her point of view because of her metal sternum and the neon green mass against it. The unusually-shaped green object was offset slightly to her left, and it rocked back and forth in a fast rhythm.

Link touched the clear material over it. It moved even faster in response, and he looked up into her eyes.

'My ... heart,' she mouthed.

"Your heart," he murmured, gaze falling back to it.

She watched his face intently, searching for emotions he had to be hiding, but there was nothing except awe. It was one thing, before, when he'd reacted calmly to the glimpse he'd gotten at the inside of her leg... But he was looking at where her heart should be. He had never seen part of her that was so blatantly nonhuman before.

And the very cut that allowed Link to see her heart was only there because Mr. Rider was going to tear it out.

Watching helplessly, hopelessly, through tear-filled eyes as the scalpel closed the distance to her chest; being strapped down and knowing—not thinking, but knowing, because there had not been a doubt in her mind—that she was about to die... The painfully sharp images that took over her mind brought with them the same soul-crushing despair she'd felt as everything had happened.

So close. She'd been so close to dying. So close to becoming nothing.

Then she was in Link's arms, unsure of when she'd gotten there, her face wet with new tears she hadn't realized she'd been shedding. He was whispering that it was over, that she was safe, that he was here and so was Midna and Ooccoo and that it would never happen again.

Vanna slowly lifted her head from his neck, wiping her tears away on her shoulders and trying to stifle her silent sobs, cheeks tingling with embarrassment at how pathetic she was acting.

"It's okay," he said, voice soft, as he reached up to tuck her dampened hair behind her ears.

She took over his mantra in her head. It was over, she was safe, he was here, it would never happen again. It was over. She was safe. Even if it didn't feel like it.

After sniffling for what she hoped to be the final time, she took in a deep breath and released it steadily. 'I'm sorry,' she mouthed.

"You're ... sorry?" he said, unsure.

She nodded, wiping her eyes again.

"For...? For what, crying?" He breathed out a humorless laugh, and after a moment cupped her face in his hands and stared seriously into her eyes. "Vanna. You don't have to apologize for being upset that—well, I was gonna say 'upset that someone nearly killed you,' 'cause I'd honestly be worried if you weren't upset over that—but you don't have to apologize to me for anything you feel. I'm here for you no matter what, all right?"

Vanna nodded, and he gave her an easy smile. It was impossible not to smile back, just as impossible as it was to ignore the way her heart swelled tenderly. Fresh tears pricked at her eyes.

Link's brows drew together in a show of sympathy, and she knew he misunderstood. He must have thought his reassurance made her feel okay to return to crying over what had happened; he didn't realize it was his reassurance in itself that she was crying over. These were happy tears—because he was so resolutely accepting and understanding and supportive and kind, and it filled her with so, so much pure joy that her body couldn't possibly contain it all inside her.

Overcome with the need to share what she was feeling in a way that he could easily comprehend, she rearranged herself on his lap to get a hand out of the blanket, opened up the back cover of the notebook to the final page, and grabbed the pencil. She carefully thought through her words to make sure they accurately encapsulated what was on her mind while staying firmly platonic. It was hard to decide exactly what to write when she could have written an essay about how much he meant to her, but she settled on getting right to the crux.

I'm so glad I have you.

His smiling response made her heart swell impossibly further. "I'm glad I have you, too."

Having slept through a good chunk of the previous day, Vanna wasn't able to sleep. She got tired of tossing and turning eventually, and so she found Link's pouch and quietly slipped outside. A chill ran down her spine. Link had given her a pair of baggy pants that went halfway down her calves and the undershirt he wore with his tunic—it was the only shirt he owned with a neckline that would keep her cut fully covered—and neither were particularly warm. Before Snowpeak, she would have been affronted by this temperature, but she found it refreshing now. She breathed in through her nose, savoring the feeling of the cold traveling down to fill her lungs.

She retrieved the axe and spear Link had taken for her from Yeto and Yeta's armory and set out to practice on the training dummy outside his house. She started with the spear, lunging and striking the dummy quickly and then stepping back and dodging imaginary attacks. Even having yet to try her hand at the axe, she knew the spear was certainly less unwieldy, and she decided that this would be her weapon of choice as long as she didn't have her bow. She wondered if the Hero's Shade would be upset with her for losing both it and his shield, and whether or not Zi would think to grab her stuff when he would come back for her.

Her arm fell mid-lunge at the thought, and she swallowed heavily. Surely he couldn't have missed his dad's comment about her backup battery running low—he wouldn't have just had Ooccoo send her away to die here. He had to have followed them back after letting his dad ream him out. She couldn't accept the idea that he hadn't.

Trying her hardest not to think about how long she might have left if he didn't, she got back to practicing with the dummy.

It wasn't much later when a faint yet piercing sound reached her ears. A baby crying, from down in the main part of the village. It was comforting when she realized that it must have been Uli and Rusl's baby, at least a month old by now. During their time in Kakariko Village, Link had voiced nervousness multiple times that he had yet to receive a letter announcing the birth, and she'd become nervous too when she'd remembered how little medical technology existed here. It was pure luck that of the current generation, only Fado's mother had died in childbirth—and with the village having been down on its luck in recent days, it had been too easy to picture yet another tragedy.

As if in response to the distant cry, she heard commotion in Link's house, including him calling her name. Vanna tried to yell that she was outside, and then tried to groan when no noise came out, and then rolled her eyes when no noise came out for that, either. She dropped the spear and went to go back in and see what was going on, but the door opened before she got to the ladder.

It was Link. He sighed and ran a hand through his tousled hair. "What in Ordona's name are you doin' out here?" he rasped.

Vanna grabbed the spear again and poked his dummy with it. 'Practice,' she mouthed up at him.

He blinked a few times and rubbed his eyes. "Could've left a note. I thought..." He sighed again, shaking his head. "Hold on."

Link disappeared back inside his house, only to return with his boots on and the notebook and pencil in hand. He handed her them after coming down the ladder.

Flipping to the back, she quickly wrote down her explanation. I couldn't sleep so I figured I'd get in some practice, that's all. Once he read that, she added more. Why are you up? You usually sleep like the dead.

The right corner of his lips raised slightly as he read the last sentence. "Weird dream woke me up. I might've gone right back to sleep ... but then I heard a baby crying, and when I looked around I realized you were gone."

She was surprised he'd been able to hear the baby from inside when it was already so faint from outside his house.

Sorry, she wrote. You can go back to sleep. I'm okay on my own. Promise.

His eyes trailed to the path to the village after he read her message. The baby was still crying. "Actually... I wanna see if Uli and Rusl need help. Wanna come with?"

She nodded, and he placed an arm around her back to walk with her to Rusl and Uli's. Without all the trees blocking the sky in the main part of the village, she could see hints of the sun starting to rise to the east already, making her feel better about them randomly showing up to their house despite being sure that they wouldn't mind even if Link showed up in the middle of the night. As they got nearer and the sound of the crying got louder, Link woke up more, moving less sleepily and eyes becoming alert. Their door pulled open while Link was still in the middle of knocking on it.

It was Rusl who opened it, standing there with dark circles under his eyes and blood-soaked bandages around his head and arms. The agitated set of his face was quickly overshadowed by shock as he realized who it was, and then he smiled.

"Link," he said breathlessly. "You're home. And you—"

Whatever he was going to say to Vanna was cut off as Uli spoke from inside, her voice as much a relief as the baby's had been. "Come in," she urged. "Don't let the cold in. The baby..."

Rusl moved out of the way to let them in and nudged the door shut with his foot behind them. Uli was over on the couch, brows furrowed, sleepy eyes marked with dark rings like her husband, wailing baby in her arms. It was strange to see her without a baby bump under her shirt, and even stranger to see her look so ... troubled. In those early days they'd spent together, Vanna had come to think of her as perpetually serene. It seemed like everything was starting to take its toll on her.

Uli smiled, but it didn't look totally genuine. "Sorry for the bad timing. The baby's ... a fussy little one."

"Can I try...?" Link trailed off, holding his arms out to Uli.

Uli carefully placed the baby in his arms, and his face lit up. Rusl slowly settled onto the couch beside Uli as Link sat on the rocking chair, shushing the baby and smiling down at it. Uli patted a stool next to the couch, beckoning Vanna to sit, and she did.

Almost immediately, the baby's cries started to give way to little whimpers. Uli sighed and smiled over at Link, and this time it looked relieved, fully genuine. "You've always been so good with little ones."

Link lifted his head to return her smile, then looked back at the baby. "It's 'cause I speak baby," he said in a soft voice, higher than his usual.

A little fist managed to escape the blanket the baby was swaddled in. Link resituated the baby to hold it in one arm and brought his other hand up to the baby's, placing his pointer in its palm. The baby's tiny hand grabbed his finger tightly. Link's smile widened at the reflex.

Vanna's heart swelled again with an overpowering surge of fondness.

"Boy or girl?" he asked.

Rusl and Uli answered together, both wearing proud smiles. "A girl."

"A baby girl," Link whispered, not taking his eyes off the baby. "It's been too long since we've had one. Beth'll be so happy to have another little girl to play with when she finally comes home. I bet Vanna and Ilia are tired of her forcing 'em to play dolls with her." He looked up and shot a grin at her with his half-joke of an assumption.

Vanna grinned back and shook her head. She didn't mind playing dolls with Beth at all. It was better than the embarrassment that came from roughhousing with Talo when a nine-year-old boy managed to tackle her to the ground.

"What's her name?" Link asked, gazing back down at her.

Rusl and Uli shared a long look. He answered alone this time. "Elli."

Link's rocking slowed for a moment, face becoming oddly grave. He nodded solemnly.

There must have been some significance to the name that Vanna was out of the loop on.

"One last way to honor him," Uli whispered. Her eyes glassy, she smiled again—not fake, but watery and wistful.

'Him' was Colin, Vanna inferred. Maybe that was what they would have named him if he'd been a girl. Whatever connection he had to this name, it obviously made it bittersweet for them. She felt very much like an outsider, sitting in on what should have been a moment of privately shared grief between those who'd known him.

The memory of his ghost, timid and heartbroken as he'd begged her to tell his parents he loved them, played in her mind. That was one piece of the promise she'd given him that she'd never truly fulfilled; she'd opted to ask Link to tell them how much he loved them, not doing so herself. She would have to do it one day, to come clean and finally let them know that he'd appeared to her, so concerned with making sure they knew he loved them that he couldn't pass on until he knew they'd be told so one last time.

All went quiet with the exception of Elli's lessening snivels. It was Rusl who finally broke the silence by clearing his throat.

"So," he started, "how've you two been?"

Link glanced at Vanna before answering. "We've ... seen better days."

"I can tell that much by all those bruises. You need to be more careful," Uli said. She gave him a disapproving, motherly tsk, and turned her attention to Vanna. "Any luck finding a way home, yet?"

Vanna shook her head and went to add more to her response verbally, but as should have been anticipated, nothing came out. She wondered if she would ever get used to it.

"She's lost her voice," Link said.

Uli's brows furrowed again. "You aren't ill, are you?" she asked.

Vanna shook her head, and Uli's features softened. Flipping open the notebook, she jotted down that she never would have come over here with the baby if she were sick. If she could've, she would've mentioned that it wasn't possible for her to get and spread an illness.

"Of course, of course," Uli said after reading it. "Just being cautious... It's hard not to be anymore."

As much as she was trying to mask it, she couldn't entirely hide the pain in her voice.

"What about the kids and Ilia?" Rusl asked. "Has Ilia...?"

"They're doin' great. They like Kakariko a lot. But Ilia... She still don't remember a thing," Link said, frowning. "They were all real excited to get news about the baby, y'know. Even Malo."

"I told you we should've sent a letter," Uli chided her husband under her breath.

"Can't stand talking to that mailman, guy gives me the creeps," Rusl mumbled to her.

Uli sighed. "Pity to hear about Ilia, though. Is she handling it well, at least?"

After telling more about how Ilia was handling her amnesia, Link gave them a more thorough rundown of how each kid was doing. Vanna mostly just sat back, since writing things down and then waiting for everyone to read it got annoying really fast.

At some point, Rusl mentioned something about intruders in the village and she started listening more, but it turned out he was just talking about monsters, not people, which she probably would have realized much sooner if the Riders hadn't been at the forefront of her mind. That was the cause of his injuries—the monster population had boomed in Faron, leading to increasing occurrences of them breaking their way into the village. With Bulblins having a cruel penchant for kidnapping, they were fearful for Elli, and since Rusl was the only swordsman left in the village, he'd been taking it upon himself to ward them off as much as he could.

Link and Vanna had breakfast with them, then went to leave for the ranch when the baby needed to be fed. Rusl gave Link back his pictograph box that he'd borrowed to take pictures of the baby, which Vanna ended up holding while Link went to grab Rade so he could run around in the enclosure. As Rade took off like a rocket, Epona trotted up to Link from where she'd been grazing, and she nuzzled up to him while nickering contentedly.

Vanna snapped a picture of their heartwarming reunion. Link laughed at the shuttering sound.

"Like we don't have enough pictographs of us together. We'll have to get one with you and her, won't we?" he said, and Vanna wasn't sure which one of them he was talking to. He backed away and patted Epona. "Make sure you don't accidentally step on the little doggy, okay?"

Definitely Epona, then. As if she could understand him perfectly.

That got Vanna thinking; Epona could understand him—when he was a wolf, at least. And he'd also conversed with a cat, and a monkey, and a squirrel...

Holding the box under her arm, she held out the notebook and jotted down, Do you think you could talk to Rade? Dog-to-dog?

"Wolf-to-dog—but I'm sure I could. I'll have to have Midna transform me later when we're back at my house." He looked around then, and his eyes brightened when he found something. He walked over to a tall piece of horseshoe-shaped grass and plucked it from the ground. "Have I ever played the grass for you?"

Giggling noiselessly, she shook her head. He ushered her to sit beside him, and then he brought the grass to his lips to play the first of many songs.

A peaceful week passed by.

Midna, in the middle of one night when only she and Vanna were awake together, expressed guilt for not having been there with Vanna in Snowpeak to warp her away. It was probably the first time in her life she'd ever felt that emotion, Vanna thought, but she didn't say as much—she was just glad to hear compassion from her. Vanna assured her that she didn't blame her at all, that she would have stayed behind with Link, too, and that was the last of that.

Rade had the time of his life. He loved being with Vanna again, loved the freedom of running around in a large outdoor space, loved Jaggle and Pergie's female dog perhaps a bit too much, and his joy was apparently all he wanted to talk about with Link. Vanna couldn't get enough of watching them converse with each other, and she was always eager for Link to translate afterward.

Ooccoo and her son would leave during the day to search for something in the nearby woods, and they'd come back at night with stories to tell. The parents of Ordon worked together to craft things for Link and Vanna to bring to their children in Kakariko. Fado, Rusl, and Link barricaded the gate to the village well enough that the surge of monsters from Faron had no chance of getting back in.

Link savored every second of being home. Even when he couldn't find the book he wanted to reread, or when the goats were uncooperative as he herded them in, or when Elli threw up or worse on him, or when he messed up dinner because he'd gotten way too used to Renado and Luda cooking for everyone over the past few months—the aura of contentment never left him. And he never left Vanna's side. He handled her muteness better than she could have hoped, patiently waiting for her to write down her responses and readily filling in silences. Thankfully, he refrained from bringing up anything that had happened in Snowpeak, including her little impulse action. If he felt awkward or displeased or anything about it, he certainly didn't show it.

Vanna savored every second, too—but it was a different kind of savoring, with the knowledge of her depleting battery constantly hanging over her head like the blade of a guillotine.

Every day that Zi didn't show up in the village, her hopes of him having come back withered a little bit more. She knew that she really should have told someone about her potentially-impending death—because what if there was no sign when she got near, and her battery would just die and nobody would have a clue what had happened?—but she couldn't bring herself to destroy the peace everyone else was in, so she kept it to herself as long as she could.

At sunset, Vanna and Link went to sit atop the large hill to the back of the ranch, overlooking the land to the south where rolling fields eased into the stretch of Ordon's forest. Much farther away than they could see was the end of the continent. Link said he wanted to go down there with her one day, because he wanted to see the ocean before he died.

And she couldn't hold it back anymore.

I'm dying.

Link read it before she had the chance to cross it out in regret.

He sighed in a way that showed her he didn't understand. "Everything's gonna be okay, Vanna. It's already been a week of us hiding out in the open and we haven't seen Rider or Zi once."

That's the problem, she wrote. I'm going to die if Zi doesn't come back. I'm almost out of battery and I don't have a way to charge here.

"What? I don't... I don't get it. I mean, how will it kill you if you're out of battery and don't charge? And—why can't you charge? There has to be a way for you to do whatever you need here. There has to. You can't..." He took in a shuddering breath. "You can't."

My batteries are like a heart and a charge is like blood. It wasn't a great analogy, she quickly realized, but she went with it anyway. Except the batteries don't recycle charge like hearts recycle blood. Once the batteries are out of charge, they're dead, unless they get more from a charger. There's no such thing as a charger in this universe. Zi is the only person who can bring one to me.

She couldn't look at him, but she knew in his silence that he was trying to think of a solution through his extremely limited technical knowledge.

His voice was quiet when he finally spoke. "...He has to be here looking for you, doesn't he?"

I hope he is, but—she didn't finish writing her thoughts. 'If it's been a week and he hasn't shown up in the most obvious place for me to be, he probably isn't here.'

"How long do you think we have, if he doesn't...?"

His plural didn't slip past her.

Though he trailed off, she knew what he was trying to ask. She'd mulled over it more than enough. Assuming she'd been fully charged the day she left three and a half months ago, assuming both her batteries had the same life, assuming her backup wasn't really running all that low—even in the most generous scenario, she couldn't see it being much more than another month.

Not very long, was the answer she wrote. That was better than saying a month. Giving it a measurable timeframe made it feel too real.

There was another moment of silence, and then Link was on his feet, pulling her up. "We ain't sitting around and waiting for you to die. He has to be out there somewhere. We're gonna find him, and we're gonna get you all the charge you need, and you're gonna live. Okay?"

It was hard to be defeatist in the face of his confidence. 'Okay,' Vanna mouthed through a small grin.

Link's returning smile was mischievous. "It's our turn to stalk him."

Chapter Text

Link was in more of a rush than Vanna was. He gave quick goodbyes to the parents of Ordon, promising to give their kids the letters and gifts they'd made for them, and turning down their suggestions of leaving come morning with weak excuses for suddenly being in a hurry to go. After leaving a sloppy note in his house for Ooccoo explaining where they would be going, and bringing Rade to Jaggle and Pergie's to apologetically ask for them to watch him until they returned, Midna warped them to Castle Town to begin their search.

The sun was setting and wisps of snow were blowing through the air, but a few residents were still out and about as they wandered the streets. The relative lack of people made it easier to look for Zi, and all the more discouraging when Vanna still didn't see him anywhere. As caught up with the people as she was, she paid little mind to where they were in the town, so she was caught off guard when Link grabbed her hand and came to a sudden stop.

She grimaced as she realized they were right next to the fortuneteller's place.

"C'mon," Link said. "Maybe she can give us a clue about where Zi is."

Vanna sighed and pulled out the notebook. Last time she just told me something I already knew would happen, and wouldn't even tell me outright how to stop it from happening. Nothing she said helped at all. We don't need vague clues that won't make sense to us until after everything's already over.

"Even if she does only give real vague clues that don't actually help us find him, we'll at least know for sure that we will find him. Can't hurt, right?"

But if—was all she could make herself write in response. She hoped it would be enough to convey where her mind was. Link was riding on the assumption that they would find Zi, even though there was a chance that they wouldn't—and if the fortuneteller confirmed that they wouldn't, she would be absolutely crushed. She would end up spending the last of her days in misery, hopelessly waiting for her inexorable demise.

Blissful ignorance seemed a lot better.

Link responded a quiet "Oh," as he realized the reasoning for her hesitance, and then he glanced back at the door. "...Would it bother you if I did? If I talked to her alone, I mean. I get you not wanting to, but ... I want to."

Vanna frowned, envisioning the worst-case scenario—the fortuneteller declaring to Link that she was going to die, and him walking out with a face that passed on the words she didn't hear.

"Not that I blame you for it, but you did run out on her last time," Link went on. "She might've given you a better answer if you'd stayed and demanded one. That's what I'll do, all right? If she says somethin' bad is gonna happen, I won't leave until she tells me how to prevent it."

He sounded so sure of himself that it pushed down the reared head of her worries again. 'Okay,' she mouthed. In the notebook, she added, I still don't want to know what she says, though.

That was fine with him. He asked her to wait outside and gave her a small reassuring smile as he entered and shut the door behind him. Leaning against the opposing wall of the narrow street, she put all of her focus into looking out for Zi, forbidding herself from thinking about what the fortuneteller was saying. She could have sworn she heard Link raise his voice through the door once, but it was right as a chattering family passed by, and she couldn't make out what he said.

It was hard to force herself to look at Link's face when she heard the door open not long later, but she did, and the remaining worry she felt gave way to confusion. His expression wasn't one of defeat or hurt like she'd have expected in the worst-case scenario, but it wasn't one of ease, either. He seemed ... flustered. He only kept eye contact with her for a few tense seconds before looking away.

"So... Where to?"

What did she say? Vanna wrote.

"You said you didn't wanna know what she said."

Vanna huffed and rolled her eyes. Just tell me.

"She was ... vague. Like you said she would be." He shrugged. "We should just get back to lookin'. You lead the way."

She tried to imagine what Fanadi could have told him, but nothing she could think of gave a good explanation for his behavior. Getting the feeling that he wasn't going to budge and tell her anything more yet, she started walking again. They were near the bar, so she figured they could go there and ask Telma and her friends if they'd seen Zi; at least they could get a concrete answer from them, even if it was just a yes or no.

Walking into the bar, her eyes went right to the table at the back that seemed to always be occupied by Telma's friends. Ashei, Shad, Auru, and surprisingly, Mahana, were all around it. Only a few other patrons were at the rest of the tables being served by Telma, and Zi, unfortunately, wasn't one of them—though, considering that Vanna had previously told Telma that Zi was trying to get her killed and Telma had promised to never let him in her bar again, it wasn't unexpected.

"Well, look who it is," Mahana said with a smile as they approached the table. "I'm glad you're okay. I only came here to catch up with Auru, and ended up worried I'd have to go out into the snow and find your ass."

"Told everyone I was starting to wonder if the beast ate you two," Ashei said.

"Nah. He's not the kinda beast that eats people. He was only stealing food to cook for his sick wife," Link said. Before anyone could ask for further clarification on that, he continued speaking. "Anyway, we came here to ask—have any of y'all seen Zi? The tall fella with round ears? We're tryin' to find him."

Shad looked at Vanna quizzically. "Did you not say he had intentions to have you murdered?"

She opened her mouth to respond, but then she turned her head to look at Link.

"She's lost her voice," Link explained. "And, it was ... a misunderstanding."

"See?" Auru said to Shad. "I knew the boy was sincere."

"It seemed it was for the best at the time," Shad responded. He gave her an apologetic look. "I'm afraid he likely won't decide to come back here ever again. He stopped by a week ago to the day looking for you, and Telma... Let's just say she was not so kind to him."

Waves of conflicting emotions flowed over Vanna. Relief that Zi had come back, and disappointment that he'd been chased off—ease knowing that she had Telma looking out for her, and annoyance toward her past self for having shot her in the foot.

"I'm not sure if this information should matter to you," Shad said, "but I recall him saying, as he was being ... escorted ... out, that he had to find you before his father does. I wouldn't be surprised if he was out searching for you as we speak."

"He stopped by the retreat last week as well, saying the same thing," Mahana said. "I can't say I was very kind to him, either."

"Tabantha Village, too," Ashei said.

"Did he tell any of you where he'd be going next?" Link asked.

The response was a unified "No."

"And you haven't seen him around since?"

Another set of "No"s.

Link looked at Vanna, wordlessly asking her what their next move should be. She was still caught up by Mahana saying he had gone to the retreat and Ashei saying he had gone to Tabantha. It was one thing for him to have stopped by the bar, but for him to have gone so far as to search for her in an unfrequented village and a retreat he knew he couldn't even enter, and still not have looked for her in Ordon, was disconcerting. She tried to reassure herself with the idea that he could've thought Ordon was simply too obvious a hideout to even bother checking, but she couldn't fully quiet the part of her mind worrying if something bad had happened.

Kakariko? she wrote in the notebook. It was really the only settlement left, and it being one of the more obvious hideouts for her could have made him decide to just wait for her to show up there.

Link nodded after reading it, and he looked back at the group. "We're gonna head out, then. If he does end up coming back, let us know."

"But you just got here," Mahana said. "You can't even stay for one drink?"

"We're—" Link cut himself off and pressed his lips together, then looked at Vanna. "...What do you wanna do?"

She appreciated his courtesy of asking her rather than him continuing to assume that she felt the same rush he did, but she did want to head out already, too, regardless of her not being in much of a hurry. Being the only one in a group setting that couldn't communicate verbally was a hassle, never mind how othering it felt.

Tell them we'll come back another time, she wrote. Hopefully when her voice was back—and hopefully when her death wasn't lurking on the horizon.

The group bid them farewell after Link passed on her message, and then they were off. Link brought them out past the eastern exit of the town before calling on Midna to warp them to Kakariko Village.

Talo and Beth were in the lobby of the Elde Inn when they entered it, and as soon as they saw it was them, they jumped up and swarmed them. They talked over each other and excitedly asked about where they'd been and what they'd been doing, giving no time for responses between questions. Hearing them, someone appeared from the kitchen. Vanna peered over to see Ilia smiling at Link from the archway.

"You kids gonna let me talk?" Link said lightheartedly, drawing her attention back to him. Their stream of questions came to a stop as they waited patiently for him to speak. "I'll answer all your questions soon enough, okay? And I even have some presents from your parents to give you—but I have to ask you somethin' first. Have you seen Zi?"

Beth gasped. "You mean the cute tall boy?"

"You mean the bad guy?" Talo said as if to correct her. "Yeah, he came back a week ago. But don't worry, I chased him off! I threw rocks at him."

Again, Vanna found herself caught between emotions. She was proud of Talo for keeping his promise to watch out for Zi, but she was peeved at herself for ever telling him to keep watch in the first place. The latter was winning out, though.

"Did he say anything?" Link asked. "Like what he wanted or where he was going when he left?"

"All he said was he wanted to see Vanna," Talo said with a shrug. "And, uh, to stop throwing rocks at him."

Link sighed. "Well, we're actually looking for Zi now, so if he does come back again, keep him right here and get an adult to send a letter our way, all right?"

"Wait!" Beth said, throwing her arms out to grab Link. "You're not leaving to go look for him right now, are you? You just got back!"

Again, Link looked at Vanna for her answer. She got out the notebook and wrote down, I don't even know where we would go to look next, yet. We can stay a while.

"It's not nice to write down secret stuff when me and Beth are standing right here! What are you saying anyway?" Talo said, standing on his tiptoes and tilting his head to try to see into it. Vanna closed the notebook and held it to her chest. "Hey!"

"She's only writing in there 'cause she lost her voice," Link explained. "We're not tryna keep secrets from you."

"Then what'd she say?"

"She says we can stay a while."

The kids cheered and dragged them to sit at the table they'd been at. As Vanna sat down, her eyes trailed back to the kitchen archway. Ilia was still standing there, not having moved an inch, and she was staring at her. There was a focus to her gaze, almost like she wasn't looking at Vanna, but trying to see through her. And she wasn't just looking anywhere—she was looking at her chest. Struck with worry, Vanna looked down at it.

She was just being paranoid, though. The cut was still covered, like she knew it was. The top she was wearing had a sort of halter neckline where it wasn't possible for the fabric to slip away and show it. Link had specifically borrowed it for her because of that.

"Ilia...?" Link called.

Ilia jolted. Her eyes flashed to Link's, then to Vanna's, and back to his. "Um. Did you ask something?"

"Not yet, I didn't, but I was gonna ask you to sit with us. Are you doin' all right?"

She was slow walking over to their table. "I'm fine, I just..." Her eyes went back to Vanna's chest. "That... That shirt and jacket—they're mine, aren't they?"

Vanna looked down at herself again. She had no idea if she was wearing Ilia's clothes or not. Link had just gone out into the village and brought a whole outfit back to her one day when she'd made a comment about having to return his undershirt eventually; she hadn't asked who the clothes had belonged to, and Link hadn't said. She had assumed Uli at the time since she was present and could have given him permission to take some clothes from her, but it definitely could have been from Ilia's wardrobe.

"Yeah," Link answered. "We were in Ordon, and she needed clothes, so I got some from your place for her since you're closer to her size than anyone else in the village. I thought you wouldn't mind."

Ilia pursed her lips and shook her head. "I don't. It's just... I recognized them, that's all. And I haven't recognized anything from ... before, since before, really."

Renado came out of the kitchen then and went over to her. "Excuse me... I do not mean to interrupt anything, but I overheard you. I must know—might you have seen those clothes when you went back to Ordon Village for those few days?"

"No. I know I didn't see them then. I didn't look through my clothes," Ilia said.

"Then this is the first thing you've remembered." Renado laid a hand on her shoulder and gave her a small smile. "Your memory is returning, after all."

Ilia smiled back at him, but it was bashful. "Hardly. This is less of a remembering and more of a recognizing. It's not like I recalled a time I actually wore them. I just knew they were mine."

"It might not be the remembering of an event, but it is remembering all the same," Renado said. "When you returned home, you did not recognize anything at all, correct? And now you have recognized something. However minor a recognition this is, it proves you have the potential to regain your memories."

"So maybe now you'll start remembering more stuff!" Beth said.

Ilia just shrugged and looked down. "Maybe. But I wouldn't get my hopes up just because after three months I remembered the fact that I owned some clothes. Anyway... I'm going to help finish dinner. You're staying, right, Link?"

Link agreed to stay for dinner, saying that the kids might explode if he didn't talk to them, and Ilia and Renado went back to the kitchen together. Vanna was very aware of how Ilia hadn't asked if she was staying. On the positive side of things, it could have been simply because Ilia knew that she was staying if he was, but she still wondered if Ilia actually did mind her wearing her clothes.

As Link regaled the kids with an account of what they had gotten up to since they'd last seen them—skipping over what had happened to Vanna—her mind wandered back to what Fanadi could have told him. The only thing she was sure of was that she hadn't outright said that her death was inevitable. On the other hand, it didn't seem that she had necessarily said that it wasn't inevitable, either—Fanadi was vague, after all, Link had agreed. It left her feeling like her future was teetering on a narrow pillar, and she couldn't even see the pillar itself until she would fall off one side or the other.

The more she thought about it, the more determined she became to squeeze the answer out of Link.

After dinner, the kids asked if they were still staying, and Link once again deferred to her. She opened the notebook on the table between them and pointed to the response she had prewritten as he'd talked to the kids: We need to talk.

Link excused them, saying they would at least come back once they'd discussed things to let them know, and she led them out of the Elde Inn and over to the shack she'd claimed. It had gotten dark, so Link lit the sconces inside before sitting on the bed next to her. Vanna flipped the notebook open to the page where she had another response prewritten in anticipation, and she held it over to him.

You seriously need to tell me what the fortuneteller said. I know I told you that I didn't want to know, but that was only in case she would say I was going to die. Pretty sure she didn't say that, so just tell me already. Please.

"...She didn't," he finally said. "She said you'll live."

Those words were a weight off her shoulders—so much so that she was almost upset with him for not telling her right away that she'd said as much. But as she considered it, it occurred to her that there had to be a reason why he'd hesitated. There had to be more to it than that.

What's the catch? she wrote.

"She only said she sees you living as long as you don't stray from the path you're on now... And she wouldn't tell me what path you're on now, or what paths to avoid, anything. Just that you're already on the right one. That you know what to do. When I tried tellin' her you don't, she insisted. 'Whether or not she knows, she knows,'" he said, ending with an unflattering imitation of her voice. "So the whole thing is the catch."

And just as easily as the weight was lifted, it was back on. She understood now why he'd hesitated to tell her—it put all the pressure on her to do everything right. It also explained why he'd kept on leaving it up to her to decide where they should go and when. He was trying to follow Fanadi's 'advice,' if it could be called that.

But Fanadi was wrong. Vanna didn't know what to do. She'd run Zi out of practically every town in Hyrule, and they had no leads at all. They didn't even know for sure that he was in this universe anymore, what with him not having been seen in a week.

She sighed. What happened to staying and demanding an answer from her?

"I tried, but... She told me any more time I spent demanding answers from her was only pushing you further from your path. So I left. I didn't want it to be my fault we were too late to find Zi or something."

It wouldn't be your fault.

"I would feel like it was."

It could have gone without saying that he would. He blamed himself for the death of a woman he hadn't even met until she was already dead.

Rather than lingering on his tendency toward taking the blame on things he had no fault in, she steered the conversation back to the fortuneteller. Did she really not say anything else?

"Well..." Link looked away. "Not anything else that's relevant to finding Zi, no."

He looked flustered again, like he had when walking out earlier. Whatever else she'd told him, it wasn't something he wanted to talk to her about—but he hadn't originally wanted to tell her what Fanadi had said about her living, either, so she wondered if she could get him to spit it out, too.

Will you tell me?

He stalled responding, but he eventually did. It was a non-answer. "...Once we find Zi and you're in the clear."

Maybe it was just a touch of vanity talking, but she was sure that it had to do with her, and her pessimism made her sure it wasn't a good thing. She couldn't help but think that it had something to do with the feelings she had for him that she'd made more than obvious, feelings that he didn't and couldn't return—and he was waiting until she was in the clear to reject her, because he didn't want the rest of her days to be spent with hard feelings and awkwardness on the chance that they wouldn't find Zi.

She didn't have much time to get herself in a bad mood about that thought, though, because Midna appeared in front of them with a groan. "Do you guys have any idea how annoying it is to only hear one side of a conversation?"

"She doesn't have a choice right now," Link said.

"Doesn't mean it's not annoying," Midna said. "So. Miss Fortuneteller says you know what path to take, huh?"

Vanna shrugged and wrote down I don't, though, and showed it to her.

"Come on. You've known this guy all your life—not that that's a very long time for a toddler—" she said, going right on even when Vanna narrowed her eyes at her, "—and you really can't think of where he would be?"

"That might work better if he was from this world," Link said. "It's not like he has places he frequents here."

"She should still know him well enough to be able to put herself in his shoes, even if he's walking around in a different world." Midna floated close to her. "Come on, think. If you were Zi, and you were trying to find you in this world, where else would you be?"

Vanna's first instinct was to respond in frustration that she had thought about it, and that was why they'd already checked two places he'd gone to, but her pencil paused above the paper as she remembered the times she and Zi had run into each other in Hyrule. The first time, he had been in Telma's Bar waiting for her to show up, because he'd done his research on the game and he knew she would come to the bar eventually. Then there was the second time they'd run into each other, in the desert, where he'd been waiting again for her to show up, because he knew she was supposed to go there next. Finally, he'd found her in the mansion in Snowpeak. Though he hadn't already been there waiting when she'd first gotten there, he still had come because he knew she would go there.

That was the common thread throughout all of their encounters: he knew where she would show up, because he knew the order of events in the game.

She might not have known the events of the game as well as he did, but she did at least know what order the temples were in, because he had sent her that list of them way back. Twice in a row, now, he had found her at temples on that very list.

If she could speak, she would have shouted.

Not for the first time that day, she was caught between triumph and exasperation. Of course Zi would end up waiting for her in the next temple that she would inevitably show up in, not some village that she may or may not even be in at the same time as him.

Her little epiphany was apparently obvious without her saying or writing anything. "You figured it out?" Link said.

Vanna nodded. He's at the next temple. He has to be.

Midna floated over her shoulder to read it. "The next temple?"

Where the next fragment of the mirror should be, she clarified. Zi said the one after Snowpeak Ruins is called the Temple of Time.

"That's in Castle Town," Link said. Vanna raised an eyebrow at him, and he blinked slowly, then shook his head. "Actually... I don't know. I've never heard of it."

"You sounded pretty sure it was in Castle Town for someone who's never heard of it," Midna said.

Link shrugged. "It ... sounded like the right place."

Shouldn't it be in an ancient grove? Vanna wrote. That was where those sages in the Arbiter's Grounds said the next shard is.

"Snowy mountains, then an ancient grove, then the heavens," Midna said, nodding. "Castle Town doesn't exactly count as a grove of any kind, if you ask me."

"Did Zi say where it is?" Link asked.

She shook her head. He only told me the names of the temples and what boss is in them.

"It's probably in the south where all the trees are, don't you think?" Midna said.

Vanna remembered Rusl talking about how there had been a sudden influx of monsters in the Faron region—just like how there had been an influx of monsters in the Yetis' mansion after Yeto had brought the first mirror shard there. Even ignoring the obvious connection of it being in a place with trees, it made sense for it to be there.

Probably, she wrote. Maybe it's the same grove as the Sacred Grove in Faron?

"That sounds about right," Link said.

"You also thought it being in Castle Town sounded right," Midna said.

"'Cause it did, at first," he said, rubbing his nape. He looked at Vanna. "So... This is the path you wanna take?"

Vanna nodded. She was sure he was there.

"Then what are we waiting for? Let's go find him and get that next shard!" Midna said.

The thought of seeing him again so soon made Vanna's stomach clench for reasons she could hardly understand. She knew she needed to find him, that he was her only hope of not running out of battery... But a charger was all she'd really been thinking about finding. Not him. After everything that had happened between them, she didn't know how to feel about facing him again.

Not to mention the associated upcoming rejection.

She looked out the window, where it was nearly pitch-black already. We could wait until morning when it'll be easier to actually see him.

"I could see him just fine, 'specially if I'm a wolf," Link said. "And hey, if I'm a wolf, I might be able to sniff him out and find him quicker."

That made it even worse.

Won't more monsters be awake if we go now? Vanna knew it was a bit of a stretch, too; Link could handle whatever monsters came his way, even more so if she and Midna were with him to lend a hand. She just didn't know how to explain that she needed time.

"What, are you gonna let some stupid monsters keep you from finding someone who can save your life?" Midna asked.

I just don't see a point in rushing. It'll be weeks before my battery runs out. Vanna didn't add in the 'probably' that she was thinking. The path we take is up to me, isn't it?

"If you listen to that kook of a fortuneteller..." Midna mumbled.

"It is up to you," Link said. "If you wanna go in the morning, we'll go in the morning."

Let's go tell the kids we're staying the night, then.

Midna acquiesced, disappearing into the shadows without complaint, and Link and Vanna headed back to the inn.

Satisfied as Vanna was at her success in buying herself a little more time, she worried that it wouldn't be enough. No amount of time seemed like enough to sort out the complicated feelings she held toward Zi. The resentment for endangering her, and the gratitude for saving her; the urge to punch him, and the desire to hug him—it was all too much for her to make sense of.

She expected it, but she still wasn't pleased when her thoughts kept her awake that night.

Chapter Text

After hours and hours of tossing and turning, Vanna gave up trying to sleep.

Link had asked her to stay the night in the Elde Inn with him and everyone else instead of staying alone in the shack as she usually did when they were in Kakariko, so she had to be quiet to slip out. She left the notebook next to Link open on a page explaining that she was going for a walk to clear her head, and she pulled the spear from his pouch—just in case—before tiptoeing out of the room and heading down the steps.

She thought she was in the clear until a calm voice spoke from the back of the lobby. "Leaving by yourself?"

Startled, she whirled around quickly to see Renado sitting at one of the tables. She felt oddly guilty, like she'd been caught by her mom trying to sneak out, though she knew she had no reason to feel that way. Renado didn't look disappointed or angered or anything like that. He was just curious—which was fair enough, because it probably was a bit weird that she was walking out alone with a spear in her hand at an ungodly hour in the morning.

She didn't know how else to explain what she was up to with her voice gone and the notebook upstairs, so she made a walking motion with two fingers and hoped he would understand.

"You are merely going for a walk," he said, and she nodded.

She could tell right away there was more he wanted to say, but it took him a few moments to gather his words before he spoke them. She imagined that he might ask why she was going on a walk, or why she was taking a spear with her, or why she was even awake.

None of her guesses were close to what he ended up asking. "...It was not a human illness that resulted in the loss of your voice, was it?"

Her heartrate spiked. It was the first time he'd mentioned her not being human in the two months since she had told him the truth. With how he treated her not having changed, she'd practically forgotten he even knew.

"I only ask to be certain there is nothing I can do to help," he said.

Slowly, she shook her head. No amount of expertise in healing people would be useful in restoring her.

"That is quite unfortunate," he said. "If you ever find a way in which I can help you, do let me know. I will tell Link you have gone for a walk if he awakens before you return."

She wanted to tell him that he'd helped more than enough and that she'd already left a note for Link, but since she couldn't, she just gave him a grateful smile and nodded. He nodded in return before letting his eyes drift down to the letters on the table in front of him, and she took that as her cue to leave.

Though she originally intended to go straight to the little alcove at the back of the graveyard, she found her sights set on the Spirit's Spring at the end of the village. She kept the spear in her hand as she walked there, but only loosely, and her eyes didn't stray from the path before her. She felt strangely calm, not at all worried that she was alone in the dark of night with no voice to yell for help should she need it.

She stopped when she felt the spring's cold water lap up over her toes and wet her borrowed sandals.

Clarity hit her then. She didn't know what she was thinking coming here. That Eldin would pop up out of the spring and give her the answers to all her problems? If she knew one thing about the Light Spirits, it was that they were selective. She still had only seen one, once—and she'd quickly chalked that one time up to being nothing more than happenstance, because she'd just so happened to be there when Lanayru had to come out because of Zant. She had simply been a bystander, a witness.

It wasn't like she could call for Eldin with no voice, anyway. Sighing, she turned away from the spring and headed to where she'd intended to go before she'd gotten distracted.

As she finally entered the graveyard, she stopped yet again. Sitting before the alcove, impossible to miss with his bright glow, was the golden wolf. She had half a mind to turn around and go back to the inn, figuring she couldn't talk to him anyway ... but even then, and even though it'd only been about a week and a half since she'd last spent time with him, she still wanted to see him again.

He pounced at her once she approached him. The bright white that overtook her vision faded into the soft gray of the snow-covered world of her subconscious they always met in. The golden wolf tipped his head back to howl, and in the blink of an eye was transformed into his undead warrior self.

"We meet again."

She did what she was unfortunately starting to get used to doing. She nodded to acknowledge him, then pointed to her throat.

The Hero's Shade was silent as she was for a few seconds. "...You do know where we are, correct?"

Vanna nodded again, but arched an eyebrow. They were in her subconscious mind—or, if he wanted to know what their surroundings were meant to represent, then they were atop snow that covered all but the highest towers of Hyrule Castle. Either way, she didn't get why he was asking.

"We are not in the physical world, but rather the world of your subconscious. This realm is much like a dream... And as such, that which affects your physical body does not affect you here."

She suddenly felt like an idiot. "Oh."

Through the embarrassment, there was a sense of relief at opening her mouth and hearing her voice come out.

"...Though, perhaps I should have let you believe you cannot speak, so we could have done more training than talking," he said. "If you recall, at the conclusion of our last gathering I told you that I would like for you to show me all that you have learned upon our next encounter. Do you intend to do so today?"

"About that..." Vanna looked down. "I ... kinda lost my bow. And... And I lost your shield, too. I still have your sword, though, and I got another shield, but I was never comfortable using a sword to begin with—and I got this spear, too, to try to make up for not having my bow, but..."

"Given the circumstances, a spear should be a worthy alternative. I must admit that I never mastered the spear, but I do believe my knowledge of it should help you achieve sufficiency at the least, if you would still desire my teachings."

She almost couldn't focus on all that he said, too caught up in what he didn't say. "You're ... not mad I lost your shield?"

"I cannot imagine you simply misplacing it, so I must assume that something unfortunate happened that led to you losing it. Am I correct in this assumption?"

Calling it 'unfortunate' felt like an understatement, but she nodded anyway.

"Then no, I am not mad at you for something which was no fault of your own. It is a shame it is lost, but that shame is not for you to bear."

"I was worried you would be," she said quietly. "Anyway... Even if I did have everything I lost, I honestly don't care about training right now. I just came out here to relax. I didn't think I would run into you."

"Yet you still approached me, not intending to train with me and not believing you could speak to me," he said, questioning but not disbelieving.

She shrugged. "I just ... wanted to see you, I guess. Relax in here with you. I like being here." Kicking up a puff of the not-cold snow at her feet, she wondered how this place—which only existed in her mind—was so calm. It would've been more fitting for a place in her mind to be on fire with how she'd been taking everything lately.

"Then relax with me you may," he said. "...I do imagine, however, that since you have realized that you can speak, you now wish to."

Did she wish to? For once, she wasn't sure. When she'd planned on going to the little alcove, she knew she'd only spend her time angsting and stewing over everything that was coming up. Part of her did want to use this opportunity to get everything off her chest—but her problem was that she hardly knew what to get off her chest, because most of her fears were impossible to put into words. How could she tell him what she was scared of when she didn't even know that herself?

The only one that she had a semblance of how to put into words was Link turning her down, but the idea of discussing romantic matters involving him with who was essentially his own grandpa wasn't very appealing. Not to mention how illogical it would seem, how much she wanted him to want her but couldn't accept it even if he did.

The Hero's Shade waited patiently while she thought things through. She was still contemplating when she looked back up at his skeletal face, but her mind was made up as soon as she did.

"I do wanna talk," she said. "...About you."

"Talking about me is unlikely to help you process your own troubling thoughts."

"I don't want to process them. I wanna be distracted from them."

"That does not sound very healthy."

"It's not like I'm pushing it away forever. I'll have to deal with it all soon anyway. I can cross those bridges when I get to them." She paused, and his words sunk in further. "Who are you to talk about it being unhealthy to bottle things up, anyway? You won't tell me your name, or show me your face, or let me know anything about you. You won't even open up to your own grandson about who you are."

He didn't respond immediately, so she decided to keep on going, knowing she might be digging herself into a hole. "One of the only things I know about you is that you're not in heaven because of regrets. You need to process them to get through, don't you? Maybe..." She was embarrassed at the thought that she might simply be exposing her ignorance about spiritual matters by acting like she had the solution he'd been searching for for decades, but the words ended up tumbling out anyway. "Maybe talking about them will help."

"You are only seeing this through your own perspective. Just because you are the kind to benefit from speaking through your thoughts does not mean that I am," he said. "If you truly must know something about myself ... know that I was not one to speak in life."

"You... You were mute?" It was hard to believe someone so well-articulated could have spent his life not articulating.

"Not in the sense that you currently are, no. I was capable of speech; it was simply a rarity for me to find it necessary. I was a man of action, not words. Gestures sufficed for most things I needed to get across."

That was also hard to believe, considering that over the past week she'd experienced how much gestures absolutely did not suffice for her. "So, you don't wanna tell me about yourself because you just don't like the idea of talking?" she asked. "You're not really trying to hide anything?"

"Precisely."

Once more, his answer was hard to believe. He had talked to her plenty. Looking back, though, besides his greetings and speaking to her about training, she supposed most of what he'd said to her had only been in response to things she'd said. One of the first things he'd ever even said to her—right after insulting her fists—was that 'a demonstration makes a better point than words.'

It still sounded like a bluff to her, however, at least partially. He wouldn't tell her his name, wouldn't tell her what his regrets were, but he sure could speak to change the conversation when she asked about those things.

"If you're not hiding anything," she said, "then tell me your name."

"I have evinced it to you already."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Vanna shook her head as if that could clear away the confusion. "You know, if you don't tell me your name, I'll find it. Link has to have some records of his lineage laying around."

He didn't seem opposed to that like she thought he would be. "Then find it, and you will see what I mean. I do ask, however, that you keep your prior word and do not reveal to Link who I am."

"I won't tell him. I won't tell Link anything, if that's what you're worried about." Stepping closer to him and tilting her head back to look up at him, she tried to do something that she knew would at least work on her. Something Zi would have done. Puppy dog eyes. "...Look, I'm not asking you to tell me your life story. I don't care what it is you tell me. Tell me your favorite pizza toppings, or if you could play an instrument, or—just ... something. Please?"

He was silent for a minute. She'd never wished more for him to have a face that she could read emotions off of.

"...I am afraid I do not know what 'pizza toppings' are, so I cannot answer that," he finally said. "...But I was proficient at playing the ocarina."

Vanna's improvised plan worked better than she could have hoped for. All of her worries were drowned out by the waves of information she'd been dying to know. It took lots of prompting and questions to get him to open up, but he did.

It was clear as day to her that there was much he was leaving out—she didn't believe for a second that his life was as mundane as he tried to portray it as—but she didn't really mind. She'd agreed not to ask for his entire life story, after all. Most of what she learned about him were little things, factoids and minor details, and yet those little things piled up to form a mountain of knowledge about him where there had previously been a void.

And while he still wouldn't explicitly tell her what he regretted so badly that it kept him out of heaven, she thought she had an idea. Now and again, the conversation would steer back to one thing—his daughter. His voice changed when he talked about her. It was softer than ever before, though there was an undercurrent of pain to it. He said nothing bad about her life—it was more little things, like how he'd taught her to ride a horse and play that weird instrument he'd brought up—but she could sense that something bad must have happened with her somewhere along the line. She ruled out things that it couldn't have been, like her dying young, because Link wouldn't be around if she had, but the Shade's calculated stories didn't leave her with any clues as to what it could have been, either.

Too soon, her time with him was up. She felt a faint tapping on her shoulder though his hands were folded neatly over his legs, and he explained that someone was trying to rouse her physical body in the graveyard. She hardly got to thank him for everything before her vision turned white.

As her sight returned, she saw that the darkness of the early morning had given way to the sun. The Shade's wolf form was gone from in front of her, and in his place was someone she hadn't expected.

'Beth?' she tried to say, but the sound of her name didn't leave her mouth.

Just like that, she'd gotten used to speaking again in her subconscious. She was disappointed to realize that she was right back to being mute.

"What were you doing?" Beth asked, accusatory. "Did you sleepwalk out here? I called your name like five times when I saw you, and you wouldn't wake up!"

Vanna blinked, lips parted as she pondered how she would even explain things to Beth if she could, then pointed to her throat to remind her that she'd asked a bit more than she could possibly answer with nods and head shakes.

"Oh, right," she said with a grimace. "Sorry. I just wanted to find you and tell you breakfast is ready back at the inn. Baked eggs."

Eating wasn't really on Vanna's priority anymore, but she did want to at least get in from the cold, so she nodded and got to her feet. Beth hesitated in front of her, wringing her hands and not-so-subtly peeking back at the little tunnel to the alcove. Vanna tilted her head, silently asking her to say whatever she wanted to.

"Um... I was just wondering... Ralis used to hang out back here, but I haven't seen him since the day you and Link left, and I was wondering if you knew where he went?" she rushed out. "I've been coming here looking for him every day, but I never see him, and Renado said he probably used the tunnel under the water back there to get back home, but—"

Vanna nodded before Beth could ramble further, and she visibly deflated.

"He really went home...?"

Again, Vanna nodded. She wished she could explain to her why he'd gone back home so she wouldn't have to feel bad about it, but again, getting that across required more than gestures.

Beth's pout didn't stay on her face for long, though, quickly being replaced by a scowl. "He could've at least told me he was leaving! Boys are the worst!"

As she stomped off, grumbling, Vanna followed behind her with an amused grin. It wasn't funny that she'd gotten her feelings hurt, but her one-eighty was. She was almost envious of Beth's ability to work through her feelings that quickly.

Breakfast was a quieter affair than it usually was at the inn with her not being able to speak, but the kids kept it lively enough that it wasn't a bore. Per his usual, Link was the last one to wake up. He looked surprised to see her sitting in the lobby, and too late, she realized she should have gone and grabbed the note she'd left for him since she'd returned earlier than she'd planned when she'd written it.

Much, much sooner than she'd have liked, Link asked if she was ready to go. She wasn't, of course, but she knew that the longer she kept putting it off, the harder it would be. She would only be giving her anxiety more time to fester and grow.

After walking just outside Kakariko where they couldn't be seen, Midna warped them away. Vanna was startled to open her eyes and see the large tree that housed the Forest Temple. She hadn't known there was a portal that led here, only a short walk and some chasms away from their destination. She'd been expecting to show up in Ordon's spring, further away, to have more time.

It seemed that they couldn't get to the Sacred Grove the same way they had last time, with Midna carrying them right over the abysses, unless Midna was suddenly okay with being seen—because facing away from them, overlooking the gorge around the tree, was Rusl.

Expectedly, Midna drew the crystal out of Link to transform him back into a human and hid away in Vanna's shadow before Rusl could have a chance to see her.

"Tell me when I can come back out," Midna said, keeping her voice low even though they were still far enough away that he probably wouldn't hear her speaking normally.

"You could come out now and introduce yourself to him," Link suggested.

"You already made me introduce myself to those Gerudo girls. No more humans need to see me. Go on and get him away from here already."

Link didn't challenge her further, and they started to walk to Rusl. As they neared him, he heard them walking through the tall grass and looked back. His face brightened like it always seemed to when he saw Link, and he turned around to face them fully.

"Wasn't expecting to see you again so soon after you took off last night," Rusl said.

"Wasn't expecting to see you here, either," Link responded. "Thought you've been staying away from Faron 'cause of the monsters that've been out."

"I have been, but I had to come out here to see something for myself... I've been exchanging letters with my friends at the bar, you see, since I can't be there with them. Shad discovered during his research of the ancestors of the Hylians that there's a temple they created on the far side of this deep gorge," Rusl said, gazing back at it. "Some say it was made to guard a sacred power. Though their civilization is ancient, it was very sophisticated. If we could obtain their power... Well, it could go a long way toward saving Hyrule.

"But I believe there's even more than that. I heard about what went on in the desert—how something out there started to draw in monsters, and you two and a friend managed to wipe out the source. It got me wondering if the same thing is happening down here, if something in that ancient temple has started to draw monsters to Faron." He returned his focus to them, a sheepish grin on his face. "It's great timing you two showed up just now, because I decided to ask you two to go out there as soon as I got here and realized I can't make it to that temple myself. Would you be willing?"

"Of course," Link said. "Actually, we were headed out there anyway."

"Really? It appears this was meant to be, then." With a wider grin, Rusl turned once more to the chasm. "The way to the temple seems to be past that tunnel down there... How were you planning on making it over the abyss?"

Vanna looked at Link for his answer, and he was already looking at her with wide eyes, like he wanted to ask her to hurry up and come up with something. If she could've talked, she would've just told Rusl about Midna—but knowing Midna, she probably would've not shown herself and made Vanna look crazy.

"Uh... We weren't gonna take the tunnel," Link said. "We were gonna climb up the cliff and go over. Least there's ground beneath us here."

"It's quite steep ... but that does look to be the safest way. Perhaps I should stay here and spot you."

"No," Link hurriedly said. "No, you don't have to do that. You should go ahead back home. Sure Uli doesn't want you out here longer than necessary, anyway."

Rusl waved a hand. "She'll be fine for a few more minutes. I'd rather you two have someone to catch you if you fall."

Link looked at Vanna, and she rapidly shook her head. He had to get Rusl away so Midna could come out. She was not going to climb a thirty-foot sheer cliff face.

"Really, Rusl," he said. "You can go home. We're both good climbers. We'll be fine."

"I insist. Good climbers or not, accidents happen. Go on, now."

Or apparently she was going to climb a thirty-foot sheer cliff face, because Rusl lightly shoved Link toward the cliff face, and Link shot her a sorry look before he started climbing. She had to work to keep the glare off her face as Rusl turned to beckon her up the cliff.

Every second of climbing sucked, and she could practically feel Midna's laughter from her shadow. If Rusl ever believed Link's claim that they were both good climbers, he certainly didn't for long, because he had to catch her when she fell. Three times. The first time, Link—already standing among the trees at the top of the cliff—yelled down the excuse that it was because she was wearing sandals, but by the next time he'd already given up on making excuses. Rusl stayed polite anyway, only making lighthearted jokes that made her cringe each time. When she finally made it close enough to the top, Link reached for her and pulled her the rest of the way up.

Rusl yelled up to wish them luck, but Vanna was too embarrassed to look back down at him, so she went ahead and walked along the top of the cliff until she got over to where the edge of the tunnel jutted out down below on the other side. While she was grateful that Midna could help her get down, she almost didn't want to see her.

"Sorry 'bout that," Link muttered as he came over to her.

"Are we out of his sight?" Midna asked quietly.

"Yeah, he's gone."

"You have no idea how bad I wish I could've seen that!" Midna laughed as she popped up out of Vanna's shadow.

"Okay, that's enough picking," Link said. "Why don't you help us get down?"

"She fell like five times, and you expect me to only say one thing about it?"

"You could've also not said anything."

Midna snorted and rolled her eyes. "As if," she said, before she floated down to the tunnel.

Her hand-hair whipped out to grab and pull Link down, and then she looked up at Vanna. From the look on her face, Vanna knew she had something in mind. She thought Midna might refuse to pull her down so she would have to climb and she could get to see her fall.

That guess was close enough—Midna flew up behind her so fast she hardly saw it and pushed her right off the ledge.

Vanna slammed into Link with enough force to make him stumble and knock the breath out of both of them, and Midna's laughter echoed through the forest loud enough to scare birds away. Link lowered her a few inches until her feet were on the ground, arms staying tight around her waist for longer than was really necessary as she balanced herself. Her cheeks burned hotter as she realized how close his face was to hers.

"You okay?" Link asked as he finally let her go.

'I'm fine,' she unthinkingly mouthed, only to nod when nothing came out.

Midna then helped them over the rest of the chasms without any more incidents, and before Vanna had time to process any of what had happened, they were upon the threshold of the Sacred Grove. If she was right, then Zi was just beyond these labyrinthine woods. All her embarrassment washed away, replaced by the irrational fear she'd been trying to push down.

At least the ethereal beauty of the grove broke through it, even if only barely. It was a surprise how unchanged it was from the last time she'd seen it; the passing of the seasons hadn't so much as dimmed a single leaf.

And just like the last time, the small, marionette-like creature dropped down from the foliage above, holding his lantern and horn—but as she drew him in, she noticed that he wasn't quite the same. His lantern didn't seem to glow as bright, and the smile she'd previously thought was permanently etched onto his face was closer to a frown. He didn't greet them with a giggle as he had before, either. He snarled, stamped his foot on the ground, and blew hard on his horn, summoning at least ten marionettes to his sides.

In the chaos of his marionettes rushing toward them, the creature escaped into a tunnel. Link rushed forward to take them out with his sword. Vanna had left all of her weaponry in one of his pouches, not prepared to fight, so she stayed behind with Midna at her side. As one of the marionettes managed to slip around Link, Midna used her powers to freeze it in place. Without instruction, and without thinking about it, Vanna reeled her arm back and punched, and it splintered to pieces around her fist. Link wheeled around, finished with the others, in time to watch it as it exploded away bit by bit.

For how easily the marionette broke apart, it still hurt. Upon inspecting her hand afterward, there were little nicks here and there where the metal of her knuckles was visible, some with small pricks of wood partially embedded underneath her skin.

"Wow, maybe you don't even need a stupid bow after all!" Midna said.

Link sheathed his sword and carefully grabbed her hand while looking it over. "You okay runnin' around with some splinters until we catch that li'l guy?"

The notebook and pencil were stashed away in one of Link's pouches like her weaponry, so Vanna couldn't effectively tell him she wasn't so fragile that a couple of splinters and teensy cuts would kill her, and she had to settle with a nod.

He got the spear out for her so she wouldn't have to risk more splinters anyway, and then they took off after the creature. Passing through the tunnel, she noticed that the little numbers she'd carved into it to mark that she'd been there before were gone. It wasn't like they'd been overgrown by moss or vines, but like they had never been there at all. They probably were no longer necessary, considering Link hadn't run off and left her behind this time, but she couldn't understand how they'd managed to up and disappear.

Since they couldn't easily discuss which paths they wanted to take, and he wanted to stay ahead of her anyway, Link took the lead. She wasn't sure if it was because the little creature was angrier today, or the marionettes had it out more for Link than her, but either way, there were more of them than she had ever run into the last time when they were separated.

Link said it was harder to find the creature this time since he wasn't playing any music—which confused her, because she'd only found him by his song once last time, and that was what Link had been following the entire time—so they stopped in each glade to thoroughly look it over in search of him. Surprisingly, she was the first one to find him.

He was curled up in a ball behind a tree. The glow of his eyes darkened as he saw her, and he blew his horn right in her face, sending a torrent of leaves at her. By the time she batted the leaves out of her sight, he was gone, and six marionettes were in his place. It was back to square one.

Despite everything, it was easy to become preoccupied looking for the creature. Vanna stopped thinking about why they were here in the first place. Until she was reminded.

And she was reminded when she found Zi's body curled up on the ground.

Chapter Text

Vanna had been prepared to feel so many things upon seeing Zi again. Angered betrayal and contented relief were her strongest guesses, but there were a slew of other clashing emotions that swirled beneath them. For how negative a great deal of them were, one of the most primary negative emotions was not one she'd considered she might feel: fear.

And that was exactly what she felt.

For a solid moment, she believed he was dead—but the fear didn't pass even when she fell to her knees at his side and took in the slightest up-and-down of his chest, because even though he was at least breathing, he looked so much worse up close than she could have imagined. Dark circles surrounded his closed, sunken-in eyes. His usually vibrant golden skin had turned sallow, was littered with cuts and bruises, and was clinging too closely to the bone underneath. He'd always been thin, never having filled out as he grew taller and taller, but he was on a whole other level now.

She could hardly reconcile the boy she knew with this almost-corpse. It was incomprehensible how he could have wasted away so fast in a week.

But even aside from all of that, simply seeing him left Vanna with a deep feeling of what she could only describe as wrongness. On some level, she supposed she'd come to terms with the idea of never seeing him again when he'd walked out the door and left her to die—and even though he hadn't, really, since he'd come back to save her, the fact that she was actually seeing him once more was still hard to wrap her head around.

Vanna was in a daze as Midna and Link came up beside them and started talking, and she didn't fully hear anything they said. She inferred they were talking about what to do with him, though, when Link scooped Zi into his arms and stood up. It looked ridiculous with Zi's long limbs hanging all over the place. It shouldn't have been possible for someone so much smaller to carry him, but Link did with frightening ease.

Midna warded off the marionettes that descended upon them as they navigated out of the Sacred Grove, and used her hand-hair to carry them past the chasms and up and over the cliff back to the clearing outside the Forest Temple. Vanna stayed by Link's side, her eyes never leaving Zi for more than a few seconds while they took the path back to Ordon.

Ooccoo and her son were in Link's house when they entered it, rooting through the things he kept in his storage chest. She clucked and stuttered out a sheepish apology, but Link didn't seem to mind—he cut her apology short, asking her if she would warp them to Kakariko Village so they could get Zi seen by the village healer.

Vanna had to tame her urge to run to Renado once they appeared in Kakariko. Link walked down the village at an agonizingly normal pace. She went a bit ahead with the silent justification that she needed to check if Renado was in the sanctuary first, which he wasn't, before she slowed to trail beside Link as he carried Zi to the inn instead. The extra time only allowed more worries to grow. A healer in a ramshackle inn had nothing on a doctor in a sterile hospital with all of her world's medical technologies at their disposal. Renado's potions might have helped Link's broken bones heal, might have helped Ralis recover from his illness, but nothing in this world could have saved Colin, and what if Zi was closer to Colin than he was to Link or Ralis?

That line of thinking brought her to something she'd been too stunned to fully consider—Zi had come here from their world, with NEVA. If Renado couldn't do anything, she could just send him back.

Her relief at having a potential backup plan didn't last for long, though, because she looked at Zi's wrists to see if he brought one or two or even all three NEVAs along with him, and there was nothing beneath his tattered sleeves except cut-up skin. She then looked at his belt, thinking he might have stored them in his or her pouch, but he didn't have any pouches on him, either.

So, unless he could wake up enough to tell her where they were, that idea was out.

Entering the lobby of the Elde Inn was not the relief she wanted it to be. For a second, it was much the same as it had been when they'd left—relaxed, with everyone sitting around the biggest table together, simply talking among themselves—but that all flew out the window when Beth saw them and let out a wail.

"He's dead!"

Link's response was swift and resolute in the face of Beth's outcry. "No, he's not. He's still breathing. Renado—"

"Bring him upstairs," Renado said, already standing from his stool.

Luda was right on her father's footsteps, following him and Link up the staircase. She turned back to give Vanna a look when she didn't come along with them. Vanna just shook her head and hoped Luda would understand her not wanting to see potions being forced down Zi's throat or whatever else Renado was going to do to him. Beyond the more obvious reasons for not wanting to see anything like that, it would only make her wish he was being treated by an actual doctor all the more.

Despite Link's declaration that Zi wasn't dead and Renado's clear intentions to heal him, everyone left around the table continued to look like they really had just seen a dead person. Tears remained in Beth's eyes, Talo's face stayed scrunched in aversion, and Ilia continued to sit in total stillness. Though not consciously, she'd thought that the main reason Zi looked so terrible was that she was all too familiar with what he usually looked like, but their reactions confirmed that it wasn't just her bias making things look worse than they were. He truly did look like death.

Sitting down with them at the table, she resigned herself to do the only thing she could do at that moment: wait.

Time passed in a tense silence, but at least it passed. Renado, Luda, and Link eventually returned downstairs, and they did so with good news and bad news.

The good news was that Zi didn't appear to be grievously injured. His cuts and bruises were superficial enough that Renado's potions made quick work of them, and none of his bones felt broken. While Renado couldn't rule out any internal bleeding, he didn't think Zi had any, which at least was better than when he'd been certain Colin did. Zi's main affliction was a severe case of dehydration and starvation—and so long as he didn't have any unseen injuries, if he was continually given water and slowly reintroduced to food, Renado thought he would be fine.

The first of the bad news was that Zi was still unconscious. Renado believed he would come to when he was further rehydrated, but Vanna worried it was a sign of brain trauma and not just one of severe dehydration. In more bad news, Renado could guess as to why Zi had deteriorated so quickly, and his guess was troubling. He felt, as she did, that even if Zi had gone the entire last week without a lick of food, it should've been impossible for him to lose so much weight in such a short amount of time. The only plausible explanation to him—an explanation she should've thought of, given this crazy world—was magic. He simply didn't know what magic had affected Zi, beyond it being dark.

And those words were close enough to make her realize what it had to be. It wasn't just dark magic—it was shadow magic, from that cursed shard of the Mirror of Twilight that was hidden somewhere in the grove where Zi had been. It lined up all too well with what the shard in Snowpeak had done, how it had drawn in monsters to the area and sickened an innocent person unlucky enough to be nearby it.

With Renado having nothing more to say about Zi and the children keen to change the topic to something less disturbing, Vanna silently excused herself from the table and beckoned Link to come upstairs with her, already scribbling down her revelation in the notebook.

She finished writing as they made it to the doorway, as she looked in and saw Zi lying on a bed with a blanket pulled up to his distressingly prominent collarbones. Holding the notebook over for Link to grab, she walked to the bed Zi was on and sat next to him. There was a little more color in his skin than there had been, and his eyes weren't quite as sunken in, but he still looked awful. If he'd looked like death before, he looked like near-death now. It was an improvement to be sure, though not enough of one for her to feel he was out of the woods yet.

"That ... might not be it," Link eventually said.

At his voice, she peered over at him, sitting on the bed next to them with the notebook in his hand.

"It does make sense," he went on. "But... I was thinkin'—there's this old story I remembered, about people gettin' lost in the woods and ... decaying. Until only their bones are left, and they become Stalfos."

She turned her gaze back to Zi, back to his face that looked only a thin layer of skin away from being nothing more than a skull. Compared to Yeta who had come down with a cold from being near a mirror shard, Link's suggestion lined up with Zi's state even more—and was all the more terrifying, because Yeta was at least able to survive being transformed by the mirror, but she knew firsthand that killing Stalfos did not return them to the people they might have once been.

Link quickly seemed to realize where her mind was going, and went right to assuage her fears. "But he's not lost anymore. We found him, so he'll be fine. And if you're right, and it's the mirror shard... We got him away from it, so that shouldn't be able to do anythin' more to him, either. He's safe here."

Vanna only shrugged, longing but unable to believe him. Just because Zi was away from the source of danger now didn't mean that irreparable damage couldn't already have been done to him.

A few more moments passed in silence before Link was standing and reaching to grab her hand that didn't have little cuts and splinters from the marionette she'd punched. "Let's go back to Snowpeak. Check on Yeta, see that she's okay even after what the mirror did to her. And then we can go back to the ranch, hang out with Rade and Epona and the goats, and later on bring Rade back here to meet the kids. Just ... get your mind off things. Sittin' around won't help him, or you."

That all sounded nice—especially seeing Yeta to confirm if any effects from the mirror lasted—but she didn't like the idea of leaving Zi in the condition he was in. What if things got worse while she was away?

"He'll survive," Link said. "He has to, so he can help you survive, right? And the fortuneteller already said you will. So..."

'So he'll be okay,' was how he wanted her to interpret that—but he'd left out an important part beforehand. The fortuneteller had said she would survive if she stayed on the right path, and she still had no idea what that path was. Leaving him could've been the wrong path.

But she came around to Link's side, anyway, because really, how could she be of help merely sitting next to Zi? She had no potions or medicines to give him, no instruments to examine him with. Whether or not she was here wouldn't make a difference to his survival. The only thing that would be affected by her presence was her own mental well-being, which was already in dire straits.

'Let's go.'

Even having acknowledged the pointlessness of sitting around, it still took a while for it to feel like leaving wasn't the wrong decision.

Visiting Yeta was a big help with that, along with helping her fear of Zi not recovering. Although Vanna couldn't know for sure, not having known her before the mirror fragment had sickened her, Yeta seemed to be back to her normal self. She was talkative and bouncy and happy, a far cry from the version of herself that she'd met before. Yeto was very pleased with her recovery, as well. They asked Link and Vanna to go sledding with them to celebrate, but at that point she still had enough reservations about being away that spending time doing something for fun felt wrong.

Instead, they went back to Ordon from there. The way Rade reacted to seeing Vanna again, you would've thought she'd left him for weeks rather than a single night. He ran excited laps around the ranch while the goats and Epona grazed, and Link, Ooccoo, and Junior and Vanna settled in the grass. After a bit, Link seemed to suddenly remember her hand, and he did his best to pluck out any remaining splinters before stitching up the biggest nicks.

As she watched the thread seal her skin over the metal beneath, she couldn't help but wonder what had happened to Zi's pouches that he'd kept the glue for her in, and with it the NEVA he'd had to use to get back to Hyrule. He was going to have so much to explain whenever he would wake up.

And it was probably a good thing she wouldn't be able to talk back, because even with all of her qualms about his health, there was still part of her that was furious with him. Having to write down what she wanted to say about everything he'd put her through would keep her from screaming it in his face.

Returning to Kakariko Village was what finally made her feel like leaving wasn't a mistake. In the couple hours they'd been away, all of the potions and remedies Zi had been given continued to work on him, giving more life back to his appearance—and while he was still unconscious, he wasn't totally unresponsive anymore. He would twitch a little from pinches and jerk when his reflexes were tested. His improvement was reassuring.

But that assurance didn't last, because the rate of his recovery only slowed from there.

Each new sign of improvement seemed miniscule in the grand scheme of things, and days would pass between them. December 15th, the day Zi and Vanna were supposed to graduate, came and went along with them. Then the 16th, then the 17th, the 18th, the 19th...

It was hard not to lose hope. Especially because it started to feel like she was the one on the verge of death.

She started to feel tired and sluggish all the time. Started zoning out and forgetting things. As hard as she tried to play things normally, Link saw right through her. It was on the night of the 25th—following her suddenly realizing it was Christmas, asking why nobody had celebrated, and having to be reminded that Christmas didn't exist in Hyrule—that he finally confronted her about it in her shack. He felt sure that the reason she wasn't doing well was the fact that she hadn't been sleeping; she hadn't slept at all since she'd fallen asleep in his arms after being returned to Hyrule, weeks ago now. She hadn't thought he would've realized that fact, much less that he would've noticed her decline.

"I know you might just tell me I don't really know what I'm talkin' about," he said, "but don't you think staying awake is making you run out of battery charge even faster?"

True as it was that he didn't really know what he was talking about when it came to anything technological ... he wasn't wrong. Probably, she wrote in response—that was as much as she was willing to admit.

"...So sleep," he said. Like it was that easy.

I can't.

"Why not? You know Zi's in good hands, and if anything happens with him, someone can come wake you up right away."

It's not because of Zi.

"Then ... why?" he asked. She didn't make a move to write a response. "...Do you not feel safe to go to sleep because of his dad?"

She started to shake her head at that, then stopped and shrugged. I guess deep down that's part of it, but that's not the main thing I've been worried about.

"...Think you'll have a nightmare?"

Another head shake. She'd still only had a single dream, which felt like a weird fluke—the possibility of having another hadn't crossed her mind at all.

It looked like Link had exhausted all of his ideas and was wracking his brains now, trying to come up with some other reason why she wouldn't want to go to sleep. She'd thought she was the one not in the right state of mind, and here he was, not being able to figure out something so obvious. She didn't really want to tell him—obvious as it was, it felt ... stupid—but she also wanted to just get the whole conversation over with already.

I'm scared I won't wake up.

His face fell after reading it, but he quickly grew resolute. "You will wake up. Zi's here, and he's getting better every day—even if your battery runs out of charge while you're asleep, he'll get you back awake as soon as he gets up himself, and you won't even realize you were gone. Everything's gonna be fine, Vanna."

Vanna shrugged again. She knew that he was right ... but she'd scared herself about the idea so much that it was hard to listen.

"Just try," he said, voice gentle. "...Would it make you feel better if I laid down with you?"

She hadn't fully realized just how lethargic she'd been until those words smacked her in the face with lucidity. Even though they'd slept in the same bed before, it still made her heart race.

Her heart raced even more after she agreed and they lay down on her bed together. He held her close, and as she lay her head on his chest, she could hear his heart beating in time with hers. She closed her eyes and counted each beat, wishing she'd still be alive to hear them in the morning.

Vanna woke up strapped down to a cold metal table, with Mr. Rider standing over her.

"No!" she cried out. "How did you—?!"

"You've made it so easy to track you down," he said. "Going by your real name, associating yourself with important figures in that mistake of a world... It almost makes me disappointed in myself. I thought I'd made you smarter."

"How was she supposed to know that you'd do this to her?!" a muted voice yelled.

Vanna turned her head to look at where the voice had come from and saw that it was exactly who she thought it was: her mom. She was standing behind a glass window, fists pressed against it, tear tracks on her face.

She couldn't believe it—he was going to make her mom watch him kill her.

"I wouldn't have had to do this if it would've complied with its programming," Mr. Rider said. "It brought this on itself."

"She's not an it, she's a she, and all she's done is prove that she's her own person!"

"It's a machine, Daina. You only think it's a person because you want to keep playing pretend that you've got your daughter back. It was wrong to ever indulge your delusions that your daughter is anything but dead—and I'm setting things straight, now."

At her mom's wordless scream, Vanna turned her head back to see what Mr. Rider was doing, and she only caught a glimpse of the knife before it plunged into her chest.

Vanna bolted upright gasping for breath, eyes welling with tears, heart racing and head reeling.

Grungy stone walls. Antiquated sconces. Rustic wardrobe. Cracked mirror. Shoddy wood boxes. The worn mattress she was on, along with a very startled-looking Chihuahua.

She wasn't in the basement of Ridertech. She was in her shack, in Kakariko Village, in Hyrule.

Ostensibly safe as she was, it still took her time to calm down, time to figure out what the hell had happened. It took her probably longer than it should have to realize that she'd been dreaming. Realizing that brought her back to a memory of the night before, of Link asking her if she thought she'd have a nightmare, and her not thinking she would because she'd only yet had a single dream.

So, she was on two dreams, now. And they both just had to be nightmares.

As she remembered more of the night before, she realized as well that the last wish she'd made before falling asleep hadn't fully come true: it was morning, and she was alive, but she didn't hear Link's heart beating. Just like the last time she'd fallen asleep with him, in Snowpeak, Link had left her before she'd even awoken. It was weird—and slightly disappointing—that he'd been the first to wake, considering how any other time she would've woken up long before him. It made her worry that something had happened.

Holding Rade along with her notebook and pencil, Vanna slipped her borrowed shoes on and went straight for the inn, thinking that he had to be there. The kids, Ilia, and Renado were all in the lobby. Luda took notice of her entrance first, and flashed her a wide smile.

"Good morning, Vanna," she said. "Link is with Zi right now—he finally awoke in the middle of the night. He's been asking for you. You should go see him."

For the first time in a long while when it came to Zi, Vanna's stomach didn't twist and her emotions didn't clash—she felt nothing but sweet relief.

She started off toward the stairs right away, but Renado placed a hand on her shoulder to stop her.

"Vanna," he said. "I know things between Zi and yourself have been ... complicated. But I ask you to stay as gentle as possible with him, for now. He is still in a fragile state."

She agreed with a nod, although she thought that he hadn't needed to ask that of her. It wasn't like she could yell at Zi, even if she wanted to.

As she neared the top of the stairs, she began to hear Zi and Link talking to each other. Zi's voice was strained with weeks of disuse, and Link's voice was a shock—she'd never heard him sound so bitter. Wondering what they were saying, she walked quietly and stopped just outside of the doorway where they couldn't see her to listen.

"—she can't speak anymore, because of you and what you did to her," Link said.

"She's ... that traumatized from it?" Zi asked faintly. "She can't even speak?"

Link huffed. "It's not trauma that took her voice away, it was your dad turning her voice off. But I wouldn't be surprised if it was from trauma, seeing what you put her through. Being kidnapped, locked in a basement and restrained to a table, having your voice stolen so you can't even scream, being wide awake while someone cuts you open...? Imagine if that was you."

The discomfort she felt at his words was nearly overwhelming. It was bad enough being reminded of what had happened in the first place, but there was something about Link being privy to all of the details that made it ten times worse.

The room was silent for a long moment before Zi let out a shaky breath. "I never... I never wanted any of this to happen to her."

"Then you should've acted like it and actually done something to stop your dad, not helped him."

"I tried to stop him. I really, really did. And then I thought ... if I helped him ... I could make it easier on her. It didn't even feel like a choice. 'Cause if it was somebody else, they would've been ... cruel. Letting someone who doesn't care about her at all get their hands on her seemed worse than just getting her myself. Even if that meant ... backstabbing her. ...Lesser of two evils."

"Lesser of two evils is still evil."

Zi just sighed, and Vanna decided she couldn't hide anymore at that.

When she entered the room, Zi was sitting up in bed leaning against the wall and Link was sitting on the bed next to his with his arms crossed. Link noticed her first, the hostile expression on his face softening as he did. Zi's dark brown eyes then found hers, and for a second they held only warmth, before giving way to what she could only guess was shame. Cringing, he squeezed his eyes shut.

She slowly walked over to stand by Link. He stood up and took Rade from her arms, presumably so she'd be able to use the notebook to communicate with Zi, and then he excused himself from the room with a sigh, saying he'd let them have a moment. The room became uncomfortably silent once he was gone.

Zi finally looked at her and spoke, voice weak and raspy. "I'm sorry, Vanna. I'm sorry. I know it's not enough... It'll never be enough... But I'm sorry. I... I understand—if you still hate me and never wanna see me again."

Even if she'd had her voice, she wouldn't have known how to respond to that. Since that day, when her last words to him were 'I hate you,' she'd had weeks to think over her feelings toward him, and yet they still remained a tangled mix of love and hate—just like they'd been for months ever since he'd admitted that he planned to hand her over to his dad, but even stronger now after everything that had happened.

"...I get it," he breathed out. He closed his eyes and let his head fall back. "I hate myself, too. I've been ... a real dickhead."

That was putting it lightly.

Blinking his eyes open, he wrenched his head back up and looked at her again, a serious set to his face. "Still... I had to come see you. We need to talk. If you don't ever wanna speak to me again after all this, that's fine, but..."

Sighing, Vanna stepped over to his bed and sat down on the edge. His eyes opened wide at her nearness. She opened her notebook, which was starting to feel like a permanent part of her hand, and started to write to him on a blank page. Zi quietly asked her if she really couldn't talk. She shook her head, not looking away from what she was writing.

I know we need to talk, or write in my case. Who's starting?

Zi stared blankly at the page before peering at her and drawing his brows together. "Rade has better handwriting than that."

Confused—because she knew well that she'd always had perfect handwriting—she looked back down at the page, and it hit her a second later. She'd unthinkingly defaulted to writing in the Hylian alphabet, which he'd never learned. She may as well have shown him a page of scribbles.

Writing it again in the correct alphabet helped Zi read it. "Um... Whatever you want," he responded.

She cut right to it, then. What the hell happened to you?

Zi stared at the page for a few moments, forehead creased. "Uh... I came after you. Obviously. I went into the woods to try to find you, but ... there was this giant ass spider, and I chased it. And then those stupid puppets got mad at me and beat me up and stole my shit, and the spider got away, and I couldn't get out of the woods, and then ... I woke up here. I think that's it."

If she'd had her voice, she probably would've interjected with disbelief at him having willingly chased after a spider, what with all his hatred of creepy-crawlies, but she was able to make herself stay on track with her writing, asking the questions that'd been taking up her mind these last few weeks. Why did you stay behind in the first place? Why didn't you have Ooccoo warp you back here with us if you were just gonna come back after me anyway?

"...Figured you wouldn't want me around for a while..." he said in a low voice. "And I at least wanted to explain to my dad why I did what I did, so maybe he wouldn't be as mad... Didn't work. I ended up teleporting away before he could strangle me."

Did you take anything else with you besides a NEVA? Vanna wrote.

Before she could write more, asking specifically if he'd brought a charger with him, he responded. "I actually brought two of the NEVAs. I would've grabbed the other so he couldn't use it, but ... I wasn't really thinking about that, I was just thinking about us using them... And I brought your pouch with all your stuff in it, and a charger for you."

Pent-up tension melted away with the breath that escaped her. The charger—her lifeline—might've been stolen by some weird marionettes, but it was here, in this world. They just had to get it back, and she would be okay.

Is that what you needed to talk to me about?

"That's ... some of it. There's something more important I needed to talk to you about. Something ... a lot more important."

Vanna raised an eyebrow at him, urging him to go on.

"Before I tell you ... I wanna know something first," Zi said. "...Have you thought any about how to stop my dad?"

She wanted to write something along the lines of A sword will do—but she held back. Instead, she settled on writing her only other idea that didn't involve killing him. I've kinda been banking on finding a doppelganger of me living here somewhere and using her to convince your dad that I've turned human.

Zi seemed to ponder that for a moment. "...I don't know. I mean, he knows this world has doppelgangers... He might not fall for it."

That's pretty much all I've got. After thinking about it, she decided to just go ahead and write what she wanted to. Besides killing him.

"Yeah... I ... figured you were gonna say that." He pursed his lips. "So... You also think there's no other way to stop him...? No more talking, no trying to make him see that you're not a threat or a waste—nothing will work...?"

Her first instinct was to tell him that his father had more than made it clear that there was no changing his mind.

But the last words he had spoken to her before he'd turned off her voice came ringing back in her head. Insisting that he still had a soft spot for her, that he didn't like seeing her scared and upset, that he'd seen her as his daughter... That he didn't want to kill her, but he had to, because he'd been warned about robots like her... Angry as they had made her in the moment, she didn't doubt now that his words were true. He'd had no reason to lie to her, then, no reason to pretend. For all he'd known, she truly was about to die.

Maybe it all was still on the table. Maybe that soft spot, however buried, could have potential for her to tap into. If she could somehow prove to him that she was no danger, if she could somehow dispel any notions he had about rogue robots ... maybe he wouldn't try to kill her, and they wouldn't have to kill him.

...Then she remembered the scalpel lowering over her chest, and everything she'd just thought sounded like nothing more than wishful thinking.

She shifted uncomfortably. I don't think so.

"Me either." He took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. "...That's what I wanted to talk to you about. I wanted to tell you ... I've made my mind up. I'm gonna help you stop my dad. Help you ... kill him."

Her eyes widened, shooting back over to his face. He was being serious.

His words shocked her more than anything he'd ever said before. To hear him finally turn his back on his dad, in the most ultimate way, after so long of following him loyally—it made her feel like she had to be dreaming, still.

Zi squeezed his eyes shut. "I don't want to. I don't want anyone to die. But... Seeing you cry on that table... Seeing him standing over you, like you were just ... some worthless piece of scrap metal... It broke me. I can't let him kill you. And if I need to kill him so he can't kill you, then so be it." He pried his watery eyes open and swallowed heavily. "I wanna make things right. Make up for ... everything."

As ever when it came to him, Vanna felt at war within herself. Part of her wanted to thank him for being willing to stand up against his dad for her, to let everything go and accept him back into her life, while the other part wanted to tell him that nothing he could do now would make up for what he'd already done. She wasn't sure she had it in her to ever fully forgive him, whether she believed him that he'd genuinely felt like he'd had no other choice or not. The betrayal she felt at him handing her over to his dad cut deeper than any scalpel ever could.

I wish you would've decided this earlier.

"I'm sorry I didn't..." he said softly. "It's just... You gotta understand how hard it is ... to decide to kill your own dad, right?"

She shrugged. She supposed it would be hard to decide to kill your own dad ... if your dad was innocent. If your dad wasn't trying to murder your best friend. If your dad wasn't trying to commit murder, period.

"So... I guess that's about it," he said. "...You and Link should go to the grove, get your charger and everything back from those puppets. I'd go myself, but ... I think Mr. Jesus wouldn't want me getting out of bed yet. ...And I don't wanna see that spider ever again."

Vanna didn't tell him, but she was glad that he wanted her and Link to go without inviting himself. There was still too much tension between them for her to want him around like that quite yet. All right. We can talk more about what exactly we're doing with your dad once I'm back with the NEVAs. Link and I might end up going through the temple while we're down there, so we might be gone for a while.

Zi nodded after he finished reading it, and she flipped the notebook shut and went to stand up from the bed. "Wait!" he said, his hand shooting out from under the blanket to stop her. "There's ... one more thing. Your voice."

She stared at him, wondering where he was going with it—wondering if he was going to say that he could do something to turn it back on. She reopened the notebook and wrote, What about it?

"You ... should be able to use it. You're not connected to my dad's computer anymore—it can't circumvent you."

For show, she tried and failed to speak. 'Well, clearly it can.'

"You can speak," he said, in spite of her display. "You just ... have to try harder. Really try. Change your code, like you did before."

She rolled her eyes. I wasn't even aware that I changed my code before. It just happened.

"But that proves it's possible, right?" he said. "I believe in you. You can do it—you can find your voice. So when you get back, we can talk for real."

We'll see, she wrote—but she doubted it.

The room went silent again. Neither of them moved.

"...I guess you can go now," Zi finally said. "Unless there was something else you needed to say before leaving...?"

Vanna slowly tapped her pencil on her notebook before bringing its lead to the page. You know... I've spent these last few weeks thinking about whether I'd hug you or punch you when you'd wake up.

"Fair enough," he said. He then looked at her with big eyes. "But, uh... I'm hoping you're saying that 'cause you've decided against punching me, now...?"

She thought about it.

Tossing her pencil and notebook to the side, she quickly moved to snake her arms around Zi's waist and lay against his chest. He made a startled noise at her sudden movement, but once it sunk in that she was only trying to hug him, he let out a sigh and wrapped his arms around her in return.

Where he wouldn't know she was talking to him, she mouthed into his chest, 'I'm glad you're alive.'

They stayed like that for a minute before she pulled away. His lips were pulled into the smile that she'd missed seeing.

At least until she punched him in the stomach.

Chapter Text

Renado had been suspicious when he re-entered the room after Zi yelped in pain. His narrowed eyes immediately went to Vanna. But Zi's quick lie—claiming it was from a random cramp—was apparently convincing enough to dispel his concerns.

Link and Vanna left soon afterward, having agreed to collect Zi's and her belongings from the marionettes and to get the mirror shard in the temple somewhere down there afterward. They walked around the bend in the valley where they could no longer be seen and had Midna warp them back down to Faron. Thankfully, Rusl was no longer there before the chasm that led to the grove, sparing them the climb over the cliffs—Midna snatched them down to the hole in the cliff face, over a few more abysses, and then they were right back at the Sacred Grove.

Right where, according to Zi, their pouches—with the NEVAs and her charger and all her stuff—should've been, in the hands of the marionettes.

The grove was eerily silent as they entered it, the marionette creature and his horde nowhere to be seen or heard. Link led the way, sword and shield drawn and ready, while Vanna followed behind him with her own sword and newly-acquired shield, just in case they got separated again. Vanna imagined that Link was looking for the creature, but she was eagerly scanning the glade for any sign of her pouch, hoping he might've simply dropped it somewhere so they wouldn't have to deal with him.

But he finally appeared, dropping down in front of them with the scowl still etched onto his face, his little fists curled up so tight it looked like they could splinter under the pressure.

And as suddenly as the creature himself appeared, Link said, "I know what you want. You just wanna play, don't you?"

'What?' Vanna thought, her eyes darting between Link and the creature. Had she missed something?

The creature tilted his head, scowl softening and eyes seeming to glisten. His fists slowly unfurled.

"We'll play with you," Link said. "...But if we find you, you have to give us back what you stole from the guy who was in here before us, and lead us to the temple."

The creature seemed to consider this, and then his scowl suddenly became a playful grin. With a flick of his wrist, his horn materialized in his hands, and he blew out a single note. The sound reverberated through the grove, and within moments, his marionettes dropped down to flank him—more of them than Vanna had ever seen before, so many that they almost filled the glade behind him. Giggling, the creature bolted through the tunnel behind them, and his horde surged forward.

Without thinking, Vanna rushed ahead of Link, sword raised. The closest marionette lunged, its wooden claws slashing toward her. She sidestepped its attack and hit it with a swing of her sword, the blade easily shattering it into splinters that disintegrated as they hit the ground. More eagerly came forward to fill the space it'd been taking, and she sliced them down just as easily. Link had already worked up ahead of her by then, cutting down marionette after marionette at a speed she almost couldn't fathom.

Easy as they were to take down, the sheer number of them made the battle tiring—or maybe it was the fact that she was desperately in need of a charge. Thinking of that, and that she was so close to finding her charger, gave her the strength to push forward until they were all gone.

As the last one fell to the ground, Vanna was already grabbing her notebook and pencil from Link's pouch. Where did the thing about playing with it come from? she wrote.

"Zi told me it wanted to play," he said.

She could hear the unspoken follow-up—that he didn't want to trust him—but she was glad he'd given him the benefit of the doubt at all.

They continued through the glades, then, searching for the creature and taking down the occasional set of marionettes. The creature was far trickier to get this time—not only because he still wasn't playing his music to help them find him in the first place, but he was also on high alert, disappearing into another glade after they spotted him but before they could even reach him multiple times. Frustrated that her bow and arrows were still in her pouch, Vanna asked Link to trade out her sword and shield for her spear.

The extra distance it lent allowed her to jab the creature the next time they found him. After that, though, he started hiding in places too far away for her to reach even with the spear, like up on a tree. Midna, thankfully, took over then, zooming in the shadows over to wherever he was hiding only to come out into the light and hit him with her hand-hair.

Eventually, the creature led them to part of the grove she was sure they'd never been to before, and it was there, after Midna landed multiple hits on him, that he finally gave up. With his laughter, his horn and his marionettes that Link and Vanna hadn't taken down yet disappeared. In almost the blink of an eye, he went from being up on a high perch to being just a few feet in front of them. In his hands, he held two pouches.

"That was fun!" the creature said, making Vanna's eyes widen. The voice seemed to come from nowhere in particular, like his giggles—but she hadn't even thought about him potentially being able to talk at all. "I'll give you these and let you into the secret place, like I promised... But! Now you have to promise me something."

Vanna closed the distance between them to grab the pouches from his hands before he could change his mind, as Link agreed to whatever his promise was.

"...If you see the big mean spider that was in my woods, stomp it!"

With a spinning leap into the air, the creature was gone, and so was part of the wall before them.

Vanna's fingers were trembling as she opened up Zi's pouch to check its contents. Relief washed over her as she saw the miniaturized forms of the two NEVAs and her charger. She didn't waste time—she immediately grabbed out the charger, and as soon as it was out and to its full size, she placed it on her chest. She felt the strangest sensation as it magnetically clicked into place. A ring of light shone around its shiny black surface, signaling that it was working.

"That's the thing you needed to survive?" Midna said. "It's just ... a disk."

"Is that the thing you needed?" Link asked.

Vanna nodded and strapped both pouches to her belt before reaching into Link's to grab out her notebook and pencil again. Yes, this is it, she wrote. Give me a couple hours, and I'll be good for another few months.

Link frowned as he read the last few words. "What about when a few months pass? You'll need to get your hands on another one...?"

No, I'll just use this one again. It's solar-powered, so I can keep reusing it. Again, she could tell that he didn't quite understand what she meant. It gets its power from the sun. I just have to leave it outside for it to continue being able to charge me.

He gave a slow nod after reading it, and then his gaze fell toward the part of the wall that the creature had made disappear. "Let's go in here and relax while you get your charge."

If he wanted her to relax, it certainly didn't help that he held her hand as he led them into the newly-revealed path.

Coming out of its winding walls, they found that they were somewhere they'd been before. They were in the ruins of the temple that housed the Master Sword; they'd just come in from a different way. Rather than entering through a side wall, they'd entered through a cliff toward the entrance of the temple, overlooking the mossy statues and Triforce plaque before the archway to the Master Sword's pedestal. From where they were, Vanna could also see another door that they hadn't been able to see before—a door unlike anything they'd seen. It was closer to them, just after a small drop, surrounded by broken-off bits of thick stone wall, and its double doors were open.

And through its opened doors, she could see through to the rest of the temple, except it was monochrome and distorted, wavering like the other side was blistering hot despite the winter chill in the air.

"That's ... something," Link said.

Midna floated down to it, pressing her hand against the black-and-white barrier. It rippled like water, warping in concentric rings around her fingertips. "The mirror shard... It's through this doorway."

Link looked at Vanna. "Do you wanna go ahead in, or rest out here?"

'Out here,' she mouthed, knowing he'd be able to understand it. Whatever was going on with that doorway was creepy—she didn't want to be transported to what she could only imagine was a distorted world, not while trying to relax.

They sat down together against a mossy stone wall. Vanna leaned back against it, soaking in the weirdly familiar hum of the charger as it worked. The sensation of the charger was somewhat pleasant—a low, steady vibration that radiated warmth through her chest.

Or maybe the warmth came from Link still holding her hand.

She tried to relax, to simply let the steady energy replenish her. The weight of much of the past few weeks—being convinced she was going to die, the struggle to find Zi, seeing him so near death—lifted from her shoulders. But something else that had been weighing on her seemed to weigh down even harder. Link had promised to tell her what Fanadi had talked to him about, what had gotten him all flustered—which she was certain had to do with the feelings she had for him—once they found Zi and she was in the clear.

Now they'd found Zi, and she was in the clear. He had no reason to put off breaking her heart anymore.

What made it even worse was that when she looked at Link, she was sure he was thinking of the same thing. His brows drew together slightly, and his lips parted, like he wanted to say something but wasn't sure where to start.

Link looked up at her, catching her looking at him and making her heart race further. "...Do you think you can talk now?"

She raised an eyebrow. 'Why would I suddenly be able to talk now?' she tried and failed to say.

"I was thinkin'... Maybe you couldn't talk 'cause your body was tryna conserve energy," he said with a shrug. "I guess you just gotta keep on tryin'."

'I've been trying. I don't know how the hell to change my code.'

"Do I gotta go get Ooccoo? I ain't that good at readin' lips."

'You asked me to keep on trying to talk. This is me, trying to talk.'

"...Maybe you'll have an easier time if I'm not trying to read your lips," he teased lightly.

Vanna let out a soundless huff of laughter. 'Yeah, that's why you're giving up on lipreading.'

"You said something about 'giving up'...?" he asked, concern clear in his voice.

She picked up her pencil again. I was talking about you giving up trying to read my lips, not me giving up trying to speak. I'm trying my hardest.

"I know you are," he said gently.

Midna suddenly appeared from the shadows, throwing her head back and groaning. "This is so annoying! I'm tired of only getting half of what you guys are saying. Just talk, Vanna!"

"She's trying," Link said at the same time as Vanna attempted to say 'I'm trying.'

"You gotta think about something that you really, really wanna say, and say it!" Midna said, getting up in her face.

'I really wanna say everything that I really wanna say,' Vanna tried. 'I hate not being able to say anything.'

Midna blinked at her. "You said the word 'hate.' That was all I got."

'It figures that's the only word you'd be able to pick up.'

"Yeah, I got none of that," she said. "But seriously. There's gotta be something bottled up inside of you that you wanna get out."

Midna's words lingered, echoing in her mind. Something bottled up. Something she wanted to get out. She couldn't stop the heat that crept up her cheeks.

Vanna avoided her gaze and glanced back at Link instead.

He was still holding her hand, his thumb brushing lightly over her knuckles. He shifted slightly, leaning closer as he spoke. "...Are you still tired?"

The question caught her off guard, and it took a moment to process. Was she still tired? She probably shouldn't have been, considering the fact that she was actively receiving energy... But the charger's hum was lulling, the breeze was rustling gently through the trees, and Link's hand was warm in hers, his presence as steady and grounding as the stone behind her...

She gave him a small nod.

"Then don't push yourself to talk for now," he said softly. "Some rest might help more than anything else. We're safe here. I'll stay up and keep watch while you sleep."

The first thing Vanna noticed when she woke up was how genuinely refreshed she felt, as if she'd gotten the best night's sleep ever—although all the evidence pointed to not much time having passed, what with it still being daylight out just as it'd been when she'd fallen asleep. In light of that, she realized that the charger was no longer sending steady vibrations through her chest, and when she looked down to check on it, she saw that the ring of light had turned off. She was fully charged.

Neither of those things affected her as much as realizing that she was leaning against Link, and his arm was draped around her. Heat rushed to her face, and she sat up abruptly.

Link's lips raised into a faint smile. "You're awake. Feeling better?"

'Yeah,' she tried to say, then nodded, although she was sure he'd gotten it. She looked away from his face then—something she would've done regardless to soothe the burn of her cheeks, but she wanted to find where her notebook and pencil were. They were on the ground next to her.

I definitely feel recharged, she wrote in the notebook. It was so obvious how exhausted she'd been in hindsight that she could hardly believe she'd had to consider whether or not she was tired earlier.

"Good," he said. His eyes trailed over to the doorway. "Are you ready to check out what's going on through there?"

She nodded, stashing her notebook, pencil, and charger into her pouch before she stood up with him. Midna came out to help them down the ledge to the door, and again pressed her fingers up against the strange doorway, where all color had been leached away. This time, however, she pushed through, her fingers disappearing behind the ripples they created.

"It ... doesn't feel like much of anything," Midna said. "Come on!"

With that, she shoved herself the rest of the way through, and she was gone. Link and Vanna exchanged a glance before they followed her through.

Vanna was surprised by how much Midna was right—stepping through the doorway felt like taking a step anywhere else. What was weird, though, was watching what was right in front of her change before her eyes.

The temple they had been in—the crumbled ruins with its collapsed roof and fractured staircases and everything overgrown with moss—suddenly looked absolutely pristine. It was complete, its intricately carved walls standing whole, its grand staircase descending ornately to the sparkling floor below, and an ethereal light shining in through the stained glass windows.

"...We're in the past?" Link said.

"They really knew what they were talking about when they decided to call this the Temple of Time, huh?" Midna responded from where she hovered a few feet in front of them.

They began their descent down the grand staircase, their footsteps echoing against the polished stone. Vanna was entranced by the temple's opulence, her eyes soaking in every detail they could. After passing up the two giant statues—almost shining now that they were no longer covered in moss and grime—they came upon an open doorway, through which they could see the pedestal that was meant to hold the Master Sword.

But there was no Master Sword to complete the pedestal, leaving it and its surrounding dais feeling jarringly empty. If they were in the past, long before Link had ever taken hold of the Master Sword, where was it?

Entering the chamber, the light shining in through the stained glass windows shimmered as it filtered down to illuminate the lonely pedestal. Her eyes were drawn to one window in particular—the one straight forward, high up on the wall above them. Vanna realized that the shimmering light was only coming from that window in particular, and the window itself almost seemed to ripple much like the entry doorway had.

Midna noticed this, too, and floated herself upward to inspect the strange phenomenon. Again, she pressed her fingers up against the anomaly. She then zipped back down to them, eyes wide and a grin on her face.

"We can go through there—the window is noncorporeal!" Midna said.

"It's really high up," Link said.

Midna shrugged. "My hair's long and strong enough. I can carry you up there, no problem."

Link shook his head. "There has to be another way. This place wouldn't rely on something only you can do."

He walked forward, looking all around the room as he did so. Vanna followed his lead, looking for some sort of button or switch hidden behind the intricacies of the columns. Link came to a stop as he reached the pedestal, his eyes narrowing as something seemed to click in his mind.

Without another word, he drew the Master Sword from his scabbard and placed it back into the empty pedestal.

The response was immediate. A soft hum resonated through the chamber, and a mystical staircase materialized stair-by-stair behind the pedestal, reaching up toward the window. As the last staircase met it, the window rippled once more, and then it faded from sight. Hidden behind it was another room.

Before Vanna even had time to be amazed, a speedy pitter-patter and an unabating clucking sound rapidly approached from behind. Ooccoo bolted up the staircase ahead of them, wings flapping, with her little head of a son trailing behind.

"Hey!" Midna called.

Neither Ooccoo nor her son looked back, continuing onward until they were out of sight.

Vanna got out her notebook and pencil. She better not get stuck in a pot this time.

Link chuckled. "Let's go see if she does."

They began to ascend the stairs together. Vanna went slowly, watching and testing every step she took to make sure her feet wouldn't end up falling right through the translucent stairs. With how long the staircase was, it took them a while to even get near the top, but once they did, she saw that the hidden room's sole purpose was to lead right into a narrow hallway.

That hallway took them down a short flight of stairs—after they'd just come up—and left them in a large, dimly lit room. Perhaps it was because they'd just left behind a part of the temple with large windows, but either way, the darkness made the room feel almost oppressive.

Right ahead of them, sitting on the floor under a sort of pergola, was a gigantic bell, its golden surface covered with runes and insignias.

"Oh," Link said.

She tilted her head at him. 'Oh?' she mouthed back.

"I guess you've never been down there," he started, "but there's a bell just like this in the basement of Renado's sanctuary."

She got out her notebook and pencil again. Two questions. One—how giant is the basement? This bell is huge.

"It's a lot bigger than you'd think," he answered.

Two—is the bell there also on the ground?

"Yeah. Why?"

Isn't the entire point of bells to be rung? They can't really be rung if they're not hanging.

Link hummed thoughtfully. "I never thought about that."

Midna came out of Vanna's shadow and hovered over her shoulder. "Having only half of the context never gets less annoying," she mumbled as she read what Vanna had written. "...That is interesting. But y'know what I personally think is more interesting?"

Without giving either of them the chance to answer, she floated forward, going around the bell and up a small set of stairs. Right away, Vanna was sure she knew what she found to be interesting—in this perfectly symmetrical room, there was a statue standing guard along the back wall to the left, and the mirror placement on the right side had no statue. Walking around the bell and up the stairs to examine it closer, she saw that there was a large door standing between the present statue and where it seemed like the other one should've been.

"In the temple entry, there were matching statues on each side, but there's only one statue beside this door," Midna said. She got her hand-hair out and roughly pressed it against the door, but it didn't budge. "...Maybe if we find the other statue and put it back, this door will open—just like how moving the other statues back into place opened up the door to the Master Sword before. Think you can sniff it down as a wolf?"

"I can try," Link said. "Transform me?"

Midna threw the crystal at him, making Link transform. As a wolf, he first walked over to the present statue and sniffed it, and then went over to where the other was missing and sniffed the air there. He turned back around and went down the stairs, going back over to the bell to sniff that. He sniffed in a circle around it before he barked three times, signaling for Midna to transform him back, and she did so.

"There was one more there," he said. "I followed its scent, but it disappears here at the bell."

"I knew there had to be a matching one!" Midna said. "It sucks that you lost its scent trail, but I'm sure you'll still be able to find it. It's a giant statue—it can't have been taken that far."

Midna went back to her shadow, and Vanna went down the staircase after Link. There were two matching curved staircases that went up on either side of the hallway they'd entered through—the only other places that they could go to in this room—and Link and Vanna started walking up the left side together.

Up on the landing of those stairs, standing before yet another set of stairs going up to another double door, were Ooccoo and her son. Not in a pot. It seemed she'd finally learned her lesson. ...Or they'd caught up to her before she'd had a chance to get stuck in one.

"This is it!" Ooccoo said. "This is where I've been trying to get to!"

"Why? What's all the way here that you want?" Link asked.

"The ancient technology of my people, the Oocca! We've searched all over, and now it's so close, I can smell it!"

"What exactly is it?"

"It's a rod of sorts, and it's the key to us going home at last! You've got to help us find it!" Ooccoo waddled forward and pouted up at them. "Please?"

"Of course," Link said, already opening up his pouch for them.

Ooccoo was all smiles as she and her son flew in together. Link indicated to the stairs ahead of them, silently asking if Vanna was ready to go, and she nodded.

Vanna halted about halfway up the stairs, though. From that point, she could see that there was a lock fixed right between the doors. They needed a key. And they didn't have one.

Link seemed to notice at about the same time, hesitating next to her, but he ended up ascending the rest of the stairs anyway to look around the landing. "...There's no key up here. Was there somewhere else we could've gone?"

I don't think so, she wrote in her notebook. Why don't you check around in this room, and I'll go back to the Master Sword's chamber to see if maybe there was something there behind all those columns?

"You're okay with splitting up?"

Midna's in my shadow. I'll be fine.

He agreed with a nod, and she put her notebook away before heading back down the stairs. Even though she'd delegated Link to be the one to search through this room, she couldn't stop herself from looking around as she returned to the hallway.

Back at the top of the mystical staircase, she stopped.

Down below, the Master Sword was resting in its pedestal—although she'd just seen it on Link's back.

She started to doubt herself. Maybe, after he'd put it in and made the staircase appear, he'd actually forgotten to take it back out? It was very unlike him to make off without his beloved sword, though.

Another idea struck her. The first thing she'd noticed upon seeing the pedestal as they'd entered was how empty it looked without the Master Sword in it, and she'd wondered where it was in the past. Maybe in the timespan of them going up the stairs and into the next room, someone with it had come to return it?

Vanna raced down the stairs, and at the very bottom, she saw that she was right. There was someone else in the temple walking away, almost at the front door—a child in bright green.

'Wait!' she tried to yell.

He continued onward. She tried yelling again, but still, no noise came out. He didn't even seem to hear her frantic footsteps racing to catch up to him.

That's when she noticed his image wavering, just like the doorway and the stained glass window.

At the doorway, the boy slowed and looked back. His eyes widened when they fell on her, still racing toward him—but in the next moment, he vanished behind the wavering monochrome doorway. She rushed to the doorway after him, crashing through its strange barrier and reemerging on the other side in the ruins of the present time. The boy was nowhere to be seen.

She stood there for a moment, dejected that she might never have an answer for what had just happened.

As she turned around and returned to the past, her mind kept racing over what she'd seen. The boy's face reminded her so much of a younger version of Link, and so did his green tunic with its matching hat. Most interestingly though, is that she was sure she'd seen that exact outfit before—in the crate in Link's basement, where the sword and shield that had belonged to the Hero's Shade had been stored.

Had that been him? She couldn't imagine the cute little boy, with his fluffy blond hair and big blue eyes and chubby cheeks, eventually becoming the giant, ghostly, skeletal Shade.

She was suddenly desperate to see him again so she could ask.

Vanna returned to searching for a key despite her thoughts being firmly elsewhere, looking behind every statue, every column. Eventually, when she was about to give up and head back, Link came to the top of the stairs, holding up a key in his hand.

"Found it," he called. "Let's go."

She walked over to the Master Sword in the pedestal and looked up at him.

Link whipped his head around, and once he'd seen the Master Sword sheathed on his back, he returned his sights to her. He started down the stairs slowly, drawing the Master Sword from his scabbard as he went. Joining her on the dais, he held his Master Sword to the other one.

"...How are there two?" he asked.

Before Vanna could get out her notebook to give him an answer, Midna emerged from her shadow. "Oh... Could this be the same exact Master Sword as you have, just from a time in the past?"

"Suppose so," Link mumbled.

It has to be the same one, Vanna wrote. We just happened to enter during a time when someone else had it drawn, and he put it back while we were up there.

"Wait, did you see him?" Midna asked. "Is that why I heard you running?"

Vanna nodded. I didn't see him put the sword back, but I saw him when he was leaving. I tried to follow him, but once he went out the door, I lost him.

"Who was it?" she asked.

Nobody I'd seen before. Vanna left out the addendum in her head that she might've known who it was—they didn't really need to know, not for now at least. She could tell them later on once she had her voice back, once communicating longer ideas wasn't such a hassle.

"Figures. We're in the past, right?" Link said. "We should probably head on before someone else from the past runs into us here."

Vanna agreed, and they began their way back up the staircase together. As they reached the top, she couldn't help but glance back down, hoping the boy would be there again, but he wasn't.

Chapter Text

What finally got Vanna's mind off of the little boy in green was getting to the room beyond the locked door, and coming across nothing other than a spider—or something close enough to a spider, at least. It was missing half of the prerequisite eight legs of a spider, and looked to have only five eyes, one of which was huge, instead of the usual eight. But it was bigger than spiders could ever be in her original world—somewhere between the size of a Skulltula and a Walltula—and she couldn't help but wonder if it was the same 'spider' that Zi had chased, the same one that had angered the marionette creature for daring to be in its woods.

Link slashed it twice. It shriveled up and died.

It hit her then that she had never found out why Zi had been chasing a giant spider through the woods. He wouldn't have willingly gone near even the tiniest of spiders for no reason.

There were currently more intriguing things, though, than why Zi had been chasing a spider, like the giant bell hanging in an alcove of the room. A matching plaque was on the ground beneath it. Vanna walked over to stand on it to see if something would happen, but nothing did. Looking up inside of the bell, she saw that there wasn't even a clapper. That finally offered a nice reason for the bell in the previous room to have been on the ground—if these bells couldn't ring, there was really no reason for them to be hanging. That just left the big question of what their purpose was at all.

In the middle of the room, Link stood on a switch on the floor, which made the gates blocking off another alcove and their way forward zip into their surrounding walls. The gates having moved freed another spider that'd been in their way forward, and it lunged toward Link. As he stepped off the switch to take care of it, the gates suddenly came back out, and she noticed that one further along their path opened up in turn.

The solution came to her immediately, and it was too easy. It made it feel like the temple was trying to lull them into a false sense of security.

She placed one of the pots from the room on the switch to reopen the first gate, they walked past it, and then she got out her bow and arrows to shoot and break the pot, closing the first gate and reopening the next one.

That sense of security was shattered within the next minute, when they rounded a corner and came across a Lizalfos—Vanna's most dreaded monster ever since Lakebed. She quickly fired an arrow at it, piercing it right in the chest. It survived, somehow, only roaring in response and running toward them with its dagger ready. A few slices from Link's sword easily managed to take it down, but her heart stayed racing—and it only got worse when they made it into the next room, where there were three more.

The instant the three Lizalfos saw them, they sprang into action, their guttural hisses echoing off the walls. The closest lunged directly at Link, dagger raised high. Link met it with his sword, and the clash of metal rang out.

As Link fought to take that one down, Vanna aimed for the second and third still farther back in the room, rapidly loosing arrows at them. Like the one in the stairwell, they both snarled in pain but continued to charge regardless, raising their shields to deflect her shots. Before they could close the gap, she ran aside, narrowly avoiding a swing from the third Lizalfos tail axe. Link's opponent fell just then, and he turned to intercept the third one that had nearly gotten her. She fired an arrow at it low, striking it in the leg and causing it to stumble, allowing Link to deliver a final powerful blow to it.

The remaining Lizalfos screeched, the noise reverberating through the chamber as it charged directly at her with renewed fury. She fumbled for another arrow, her racing nerves betraying her fingers. But before the Lizalfos could close the distance, Link was there, his shield raised to intercept it mid-swing of its dagger. He forced it back with sheer strength and immediately countered with a swift slash, forcing the Lizalfos to leap back.

Seeing her chance, Vanna steadied herself and nocked another arrow. This time, the arrow pierced the Lizalfos right in the neck. It let out a final gurgling shriek before falling to the ground, lifeless, and exploding away into nothing.

Link sheathed his sword and began to walk toward her, eyes combing her from top to bottom as he did so. "You okay?"

She nodded.

"Good," he said.

'And you?' she mouthed.

He nodded in return.

'Good.'

With everything settled, she took in the room. It was similar in structure to the previous one, almost perfectly symmetrical, with a giant bell hanging in one of its alcoves. In another alcove was something she hadn't seen before—a black, sort of tiki mask statue with a shield in one hand and a large hammer in the other. It stood out like a sore thumb in a room of light colors and vaguely Grecian architecture, looming ominously.

Vanna couldn't stop herself from taking cautious steps closer to the statue, coming at it from the side, where the hammer wasn't facing her. Just as she reached arm's length from the statue, glowing bright blue lines traced themselves across its body, running in intricate, angular patterns, and the gem set into its backside—she hadn't been able to notice it before—shone the same blue.

The statue took a single hop forward, landing with a heavy thud that rattled the floor beneath her feet.

She scurried back, looking for Link. He was already moving, his sword drawn as he charged at the statue. Link slashed at it, but to no avail; the blade glanced off the statue's black surface, not even leaving a faint scratch.

'There's a gem on its back!' she tried to say—but of course, nothing came out.

He tried again and again, aiming for different parts of the statue—its hammer, its shield, its mouth, its glowing lines—all but for the back of it, and his sword continually bounced away without leaving a mark. It was only as the statue pulled its hammer back, preparing to swing, that Link rolled out of the way around its back, and finally caught sight of the gem. Eyes gleaming, Link thrust his sword directly into the gem, the force making it shatter.

The statue let out a deep, guttural roar—somehow—and with another hop, turned to be face-to-face with Link again. Its hammer began to swing down in another arc, but again Link managed to avoid its blow, rolling behind it and stabbing its gem again.

All of the shattered pieces of the gem fell to the floor as the statue roared again. It began to jump up and down wildly, repeatedly smashing its hammer against the ground as it did so. Link ran out of the way, over to stand in front of her, before he could get hit by its erratic attacks.

Beams of light shone out of the statue's glowing lines one after another, until its whole surface was illuminated—and then it exploded, leaving nothing behind but dust.

Link slowly sheathed his sword and looked back at her. "...Armos."

It took her a second to realize what he was saying—that the thing he'd just killed was called an Armos. She'd nearly forgotten about his promise to tell her the name of every new enemy they came across.

She noticed something on the floor where the Armos had been standing, and she went over to investigate it. Picking up the folded piece of old paper from the floor, she saw that it was a map of this temple. Although there were eight floors drawn on it, it looked extremely simple. The only way to go was forward.

It wasn't quite as simple to navigate as Vanna thought it would be, judging from the map, but it was still fairly easy. She actually found herself enjoying it—she got to use her bow and arrows a lot, to shoot futuristic Beamos and gems that would alter the layout of the rooms and allow them to go onward.

The only problem was the goddamned death traps and monsters. There were so many Gohmas, and Armos, and Lizalfos, and Lizalfos' even worse armored cousins Dynalfos. They had to take a break after one particularly bad encounter with a Dynalfos when it had managed to slice Link's arm. It definitely could've been worse—the bleeding stopped relatively quickly after applying pressure to it—but she still hated seeing Link bleeding and in pain.

And just when she thought they must've finally gone through just about all of them—according to the map, they were at the last room on the eighth floor—they came across one that was worse than all of the other monsters combined.

At first, entering the room, Vanna hardly even noticed it. Her eyes were immediately drawn to a high ledge just below a single stained glass window, where the matching statue was standing. She was wondering how in the hell they were meant to get it down when she noticed something else lower in her periphery move—the giant, dark suit of knight's armor positioned in the middle of the room. It turned fully toward them, slicing its gigantic sword through the air with deep grunts, before coming to stand in a defensive position.

Link immediately stepped in front of her, his shield raised and sword at the ready. "Stay back, Vanna."

The knight charged, its armored feet crashing heavily against the stone floor with every step. Link dodged its first overhead swing just in time, rolling to the side and slashing at the knight's leg. Just like earlier with the Armos, his blade connected, but the strike didn't even look to leave a mark. The knight retaliated with a sweeping horizontal slash, forcing Link to leap back again.

While her arrows had been useful this far against the other monsters, this thing's armor was so thick she doubted they would even do anything. Still, she nocked an arrow and let it fly, aiming for the narrow slits in its helmet. Despite her aim being true, the arrow bounced right back out of the slit, clearly not having done even the tiniest bit of damage to the monster. She wasn't sure that it had even noticed that she'd shot it.

Scrambling for another idea, she found herself remembering the battle in the desert against the horde of Bokoblins, where she was standing back by herself with her bow and arrows while Link and Mahana fought with their swords—she'd asked Link for his bomb bag, and shot a bomb arrow at the ground, defeating a large group of the monsters at once. If regular arrows weren't enough to pierce this monster's armor, then a bomb arrow had to be.

The problem was that the bombs were in Link's pouch, and he was busy trying to fend off the monster's giant sword.

Getting out her notebook and pencil, Vanna stamped her foot on the ground until Midna rose from the shadows. Need bombs—fly up to Link and take his pouch for me, she scribbled down.

Without waiting for Vanna to give any further explanation, Midna nodded and took off toward Link. Putting one hand out, she shot out her orange arcs of electricity that held the monster in place, while fumbling to get Link's pouch off with the other.

"What are you doing?!" Link said.

"Vanna needs your pouch!" Midna said back.

Link helped, then, returning his sword to his back and reaching to pull off the pouch. Rather than giving it directly to Midna, he turned to chuck it right at Vanna, and she caught it. He was just getting his sword back in front of him when Midna's arm dropped with a groan, unable to hold the monster still any longer.

What happened next happened so fast that Vanna could hardly process it. The monster swung its sword in a blur, hitting both Midna and Link, the force of the blow sending them flying backward. Link skidded to a stop a few feet away from the monster, but Midna's tiny body kept going until she slammed into the wall, where she then fell and slumped down on the ground.

"Midna!"

Vanna ran toward her, heart racing and stomach twisting with guilt. If Midna died because she'd asked her to go grab bombs in her stead...

Collapsing next to her on the ground, Vanna's eyes scanned her from head to toe. Her arms were clutched over her midsection, where oozy black liquid was pooling—but in spite of it all, she smiled up at her.

"You... You talked," Midna panted out.

"Who cares?!" Vanna said. "You're—!"

"Link's pouch," she breathed. "Potion. Now."

Vanna hurriedly ripped open his pouch, looking at the miniaturized items inside until she saw a tiny glass bottle half-filled with blue liquid. She pulled it out and popped its cork out, and held the rim up to Midna's lips.

"This won't be enough," Vanna said through a quivering voice. "That cut is bad."

Midna gave a slight shake of her head as she continued to gulp the potion down. With every droplet gone from the bottle, she let out a shaky sigh. "I'm ... small. And not human. Won't take as much."

Proving her point, she raised her arms from her midsection, showing that the bleeding was already beginning to slow.

Relief washed over Vanna, but it was fleeting—because she heard swords clash against one another and Link groan. Vanna turned to glance at Link, who was back on his feet, breathing heavily and pushing his sword against the knight's.

"Midna, stay here and rest," Vanna said.

"Don't think I've got much of a choice," she replied weakly.

Vanna pulled an arrow from her quiver and a bomb from Link's bag, and attached the two. This wasn't the first time she'd made a bomb arrow, but with her hands trembling, it felt like it.

"Link!" she shouted, nocking the arrow. "Get out of the way!"

His head turned sharply toward her, eyes widening as he realized what she was about to do. He darted to the side, putting distance between himself and the knight. Once she was sure he was out of the way enough, she let the arrow fly.

The explosion rocked the room, smoke and debris filling the chamber as the sound of clattering metal echoed against the walls. For a moment, she couldn't see the monster anymore, and her hearing went to white noise from the blast. When the dust settled, the knight was on one knee, pieces of its thick armor, along with its giant sword and shield, scattered on the floor around it. It wasn't dead, yet, but she'd clearly done a fair bit of damage to it—and opened it up to receiving even more damage, now that it was less armored.

Link didn't waste the opportunity of it being down still, charging forward and plunging his sword into its neck. His sword didn't look to go all the way through—the monster had chainmail covering its entire body—but it still clearly hurt the monster, making it let out a gurgling noise.

The monster jumped back to its feet, pulling out a thinner sword it'd had stashed on its hip, and lunged at Link. Vanna wanted desperately to get out another bomb and fire at it, but Link quickly re-engaged himself in battle with it.

Even though Link expertly evaded slash after slash, and landed his own hits on the monster repeatedly, Vanna couldn't help but wait for something to go terribly wrong again. It was hard to watch—so she crouched down again next to Midna, only glancing over at Link every few seconds. As Midna had said, her small size allowed the potion to do its work quickly on her; the cut already looked closer to a scratch than a slash.

Vanna wasn't sure how he managed to do it, with all the monster's chainmail, but the guttural noise it made let her know that it was defeated. She looked over in time to see it collapsing to its knees and falling face-first on the ground before exploding away into nothing.

Link twirled his sword in his hands and sheathed it, then turned to look back at them, and she gasped. She hadn't been able to notice it in the chaos before, but Link's tunic was practically torn in half, and several rings of his chainmail had popped right off, allowing her to see through to his undershirt beneath it.

She raced over to close the distance between them. "Are you okay?"

"'M all right—just a bit sore," he said. "How's Midna?"

"Still kickin'!" Midna yelled from her spot against the wall.

One of the corners of Link's mouth twitched up at that, only to fall the next second. His eyes widened as he stared at her. "Wait, Vanna... You—"

"Out of all the people I could've been trying to yell for when my voice came back, it just had to be Midna," she said lightly.

"Hey!" Midna yelled.

Link laughed, the sound warm and genuine. He grinned wide as he shook his head, stepping closer to her. "I can't believe it," he said, his voice full of awe.

Vanna smiled back, though she still felt the raw edge of guilt over Midna's injury. "Me either. I wasn't expecting it. Honestly, I was so worried I hardly even noticed when it happened."

He sighed, expression softening as he reached out to gently grab each of her hands. "I can't even tell you how good it is to hear your voice again."

Cheeks burning, she dropped her head and let out a little laugh. "I can't tell you how good it is to be able to talk to you again."

"...Well, if you two need me, I guess I'll be over here throwing up," Midna said.

Vanna rolled her eyes, but when Link started to walk toward Midna, she followed alongside him regardless. Midna was sitting more upright against the wall now, using a small towel that she'd taken from Link's pouch to try to scrub the blood off of her.

"You're really okay?" Link asked.

Midna shot up, stretched her arms wide, and spun around. "Yup! Good as new."

Vanna blinked. The wound that had once looked horrifyingly deep was now completely closed, leaving behind only a faint, shimmering scar. Blue potions weren't that powerful, were they? "How...?"

"Twili," Midna said, gesturing to herself as though the answer should've been obvious. "We heal easily, especially with potions." Her lips quirked to the side as she looked up and down Link. "And you're sure you're all right?"

He shrugged. "I've had a lot worse. I'm fine."

"Good, 'cause I finished your potion."

"You don't have to try to be brave," Vanna said to him. "That thing hit you hard, and you hit the ground hard. We can have Ooccoo and Junior warp us to see Renado and get you checked out."

At the sound of their names, Ooccoo and her son popped out of Link's pouch where it sat on the floor. "Yes, yes! We can..." Ooccoo's voice faded mid-sentence, her blank gaze appearing to suddenly be fixed on something behind them.

Curious, Vanna turned to look. All she noticed was the matching statue perched on the ledge above—and beneath it, a little nook...

...with a pot nestled inside.

"Ooccoo, don't!"

But she spoke too late. Ooccoo had already launched herself toward the pot, frantically clucking and flapping her wings, and Junior zipped along after her.

Vanna chased after her, but she was unfathomably fast for a tiny-legged chicken lady. By the time she made it to the pot, both she and Junior had already thrown themselves inside of it. Without hesitation, she grabbed the pot and tipped it over, making Ooccoo and Junior come tumbling out—along with a strange sort of wand.

"The Dominion Rod!" Ooccoo said. "It's exactly what I was looking for!"

Vanna slowly reached toward it, a small part of her worried that she would think she was trying to steal it from her. Wrapping her hands around its cool grip, she lifted it. A glowing orb of bright green light appeared above it, and along with it came a soft humming sound.

"What ... is it?" she asked.

"Exactly as I said earlier—the key to us going home at last!"

"That doesn't really answer my question," she mumbled. "What does it do?"

Ooccoo stepped out of the alcove and looked up. "Statues that have received its light are filled with life, and they'll move like their master. Come—try it on this statue!"

Vanna stood and walked out of the nook, seeing Link and Midna still making their way over to them. Seeing Link, something hit her. "...I don't have magic."

"So?" Ooccoo said.

"So, I can't do magic," Vanna said slowly. She pointed to the glowing orb atop the rod. "This has gotta be magic, doesn't it?"

"Why, yes, it is magic—but the magic is contained within the rod itself! Whether or not you possess any magical capabilities yourself, you can still make use of its powers."

"...I can use magic?"

"That is indeed what I just said, yes. Fling the orb into the statue's heart!"

Looking back to the statue, Vanna grinned. She stood like she was playing baseball and swung the rod, sending the glowing orb flying up to the hole in the middle of the statue's chest. The orb pulsated, and its glow spread throughout the lines along the statue's body, much in the same vein as the Armos had glowed. Head spinning around a few times, it lifted its giant hammer in front of it higher.

"Now, move!" Ooccoo said.

Vanna took a few steps back—and the statue took a few hops forward and fell from the ledge. With a swing of the rod, the statue swung its hammer in the same way. She laughed, repeatedly swinging it and watching it copy her movements.

"...It's not a toy, Vanna," Midna said—she and Link had made it up to them.

"It's like a giant RC car!" Vanna said. "Not that you'd know what that is, but still."

"So, how is this the key to getting you back home?" Link asked Ooccoo.

"I'll show you once we get out of here," Ooccoo said. "Junior and I will be returning to your pouch now that we've found it, Link. Vanna—lead the statue to the bell!"

With that, Ooccoo and Junior flew up and shrunk away into Link's pouch, and Vanna turned around to look at the bell. The lines on it were glowing the same green as the orb and the statue, and so were the lines on the plaque beneath it.

"Come on, buddy," Vanna said to the statue.

"Oh, here we go," Midna said as they started off toward the bell. "You had to name all the monkeys in the Forest Temple—now you've gotta name a stupid statue?"

"That was just an epithet, but now that you mention it..." Vanna said. "His name is officially Buddy."

Getting Buddy back down to the main room was fun, if a bit challenging at times.

The bells transported him from room to room, so they didn't have to worry about trying to squeeze him through the much-too-small doors, and he was able to smash his way right through the obstacles they'd previously had to carefully maneuver around. Vanna felt sort of bad, destroying pieces of this ancient temple, but she decided that the blame lay with whoever decided to fill it up with death traps in the first place.

A brief detour to check out a room that they hadn't been able to get to before, that Buddy couldn't follow them into, led to them finding a giant mace of a key. Knowing it was to get them to the boss, she thought back to the list of temples and their bosses Zi had sent her, and she remembered that this one was Armogohma.

Of course the boss was going to have to be a giant armored spider.

...She almost wanted to ask Ooccoo if she could go grab Zi and have him come along, just so she could see his reaction to being trapped in a room with it.

Back in the main room, she guided Buddy to his spot next to the door, where the plaque below was glowing as if waiting just for him. After hopping onto it, he turned around to reposition himself the exact same way as the matching one. As the light along him and the plaque went out and the orb returned to the Dominion Rod, the lines along the doors between the matching statues began to glow that same color, and then they slid open to reveal nothing other than a short hallway ending in yet another door.

The room past the new door was dark and dingy and decrepit, a far cry from the rest of the temple. Parts of the floor gave way to an abyss below, and there were more traps—sliding spikes and rolling spike bars and huge swinging blade-like pendulums—than there'd been in any of the other rooms, along with four Beamos.

She took care of the Beamos with her bow and arrows, and from there, it was down to simple, careful steps to get them across the room. At the end, down another flight of stairs blocked with gates just like one of the rooms earlier, was a giant door with an equally giant lock. After using the Dominion Rod to move little statues on and off the floor switches that controlled the gates, they were there, and two young Gohmas were waiting for them.

"...How much bigger do you think the boss Gohma is gonna be?" she asked once Link had taken them both down with his sword. "Those ones are already huge."

"Considering the rest of the bosses we've fought..." Link trailed off with a grimace. "But how do you know the boss is gonna be a Gohma?"

"Zi told me what all the bosses were, remember? This one is called Armogohma."

"Oh. Well... At least it's just a spider, then, right?" he said with a shrug. "It can't be that bad."

"Don't jinx it," she said, walking up to the lock and pulling out the key. "Hey, Midna, wanna come help us open this door and fight the boss?"

Midna emerged from Vanna's shadow, face contorted in disgust. "I'll help you open up the door, but don't you dare ask me to come out once you're in there. I do not need to see any nasty huge spiders!"

"Didn't know you were scared of spiders," Link said.

"I'm not scared of them. I just think they're ugly."

Midna took the key from Vanna and floated with it up to the lock. After twisting it around a few times, the lock fell to the ground, and Midna went right back into Vanna's shadow.

"Good luck!" Midna said. "Don't get bitten. Or eaten."

Link and Vanna pushed the heavy door open together and entered the chamber beyond it.

The room was vast, round, and dark. From the ceiling far above, six piercing beams of light descended, each one revealing a small patch of the room. But it was what was just beyond those beams of light that stole Vanna's breath away—absolutely colossal statues lined the walls. Their enormity dwarfed every statue they'd encountered yet, their raised fists nearly touching the high ceiling.

Without warning, one of the beams of lights went away.

Looking up to where that skylight window was supposed to be, Vanna saw it—a spider so gargantuan that it would've made anyone develop arachnophobia. Each dark leg was like a thick pillar, somehow managing to keep the spider hanging there.

Aside from its massive size, its eyes were the most unnerving part—or at least, the ones that were visible at first. Four glowing orbs stared out blankly amidst the darkness of its face. And then, as if just to outdo them in creepiness, an enormous eye opened up on its back. Its outer rim was dark, fading into a red and then a bright yellow around its pupil. While the other eyes seemed vacant, this one seemed disturbingly aware, and its gaze looked to fall right on them.

Before it had a chance to try anything, Vanna got her bow out and shot right for its eye. It let out a deep groan and slipped from the ceiling, crashing down into the floor below.

With its body no longer blocking the beam of light, the colossal statue on the wall just behind it almost seemed to glimmer—like it was calling for her. Vanna quickly ran toward it, ignoring Link's calls to not get so near the spider, slinging her bow away and getting out the Dominion Rod as she did so. Up next to the statue, she flung the orb of light from the rod right into the hole in the middle of its chest. Glowing lines still stretching across its surface, she wacked the rod downward—but the spider had already started to recover and move out of the way by then, and when the statue copied her movement by slamming its fist down, it only caught one of the spider's legs.

Armogohma groaned again, but it kept on walking—up to the wall, then up the wall and back to the ceiling.

In the middle of the ceiling, the spider came to a stop, its lower body twitching violently. Egg after egg popped out of it, landing on the floor with squishy plops, and they all hatched together—at least twenty baby Gohmas. Link raced over to take care of them with his sword while Vanna kept her eyes on the big one.

She felt guilty, again. Killing a mother.

But she worked to push the guilt down, knowing that her empathy was misguided. The spider certainly didn't care for her life when it started shooting a laser at her through its eye.

Vanna shot its eye again, worried that the laser would merely melt the arrow, but the arrow still hit its mark and made the spider fall from the ceiling again. This time, she was closer to where it fell in the first place, so she was able to take control of the statue behind it and make it slam its fist down right onto the spider's body. It made a sickening crunch—but somehow, the spider, yet again, walked it off, returning to its perch on the ceiling to let out more babies.

Everything was going just fine until she heard Link yelp. Tearing her eyes off of Armogohma, she saw Link standing amidst the swarm of newly-hatched Gohmas, and one of them was dangling from his head. Feeling relatively confident that it couldn't be that bad, she looked back up at Armogohma and merely yelled to Link to ask if he was okay. He grunted out in response that he was fine. The next time she spared a glance over at him, he'd killed all of the babies, and one hand was raised to the side of his head. She wondered if he'd been bitten in the face.

Just like her guilt, she pushed her worry down—Armogohma still needed to be defeated.

It didn't take much more. Another crushing swing from one of the statues, and Armogohma's body was turning black and exploding away. She looked for Link, then, ready to go over to him.

But something in her periphery, where Armogohma had just been, drew her sight back over. In the place where the spider's gigantic body had exploded away, there was another swarm of baby Gohmas, and in the middle of that swarm was their mother's eye.

Vanna quickly realized that it wasn't just their mother's eye—it was their mother. Legs stretched out of the front of it and it shook around, showing that what she had assumed to be Armogohma's eye all that time was actually its own back end. Compared to the armor it'd been encased in, it was tiny.

Its movements were erratic, making it hard to aim for and shoot, but she eventually got it. With one final screech, Armogohma—if it could've even been called that any longer—exploded for real, along with all its babies. Wisps from the explosion swirled together in the air, coming together to form a shard of the Mirror of Twilight.

As if she sensed its presence, Midna emerged from her shadow and flew over to it, grabbing it with her hand-hair. She started to say something, but Vanna didn't fully hear it—she was already running over to Link.

A whole chunk was torn out of the bottom side of his left ear, and his shoulder beneath it and the hand that'd been holding it were both soaked in blood.

"How bad is it?" Link asked through a grimace.

"I think it needs stitches," Vanna said. She looked back over at Midna. "Either you or Ooccoo needs to warp us to Kakariko Village so Renado can stitch him up, quick."

"Can't you do it?" Link asked. "I have the stuff you'd need in my pouch, and I think you've seen me and Renado stitch things up enough."

She gaped for a moment. "Um. Do you want me to?"

He nodded. "I don't wanna freak the kids out, showing up bleeding with part of my ear gone."

Vanna hadn't even been thinking about them. She agreed, then, and guided him to sit down on a section of the chamber floor with ample light. Carefully easing his hand away from the wound so that she could see it better, she saw that the missing chunk was almost a perfect semicircle. Trying to pull it together end-to-end wouldn't work—she was going to have to stitch around the rim.

Link got out the things she'd need to stitch him up from his pouch, sitting them on the floor next to them. Midna slowly floated over, hands behind her back.

"I'm ... sorry, Link," Midna said.

"You didn't do anythi—anythin' wrong," Link said, flinching when Vanna pinched down on the wound with a rag in an attempt to stem the remainder of the bleeding.

"I'm the reason you're collecting these mirror shards," she said. "And the evil within them... It's more powerful than you can imagine. You're lucky only your ear got hurt."

"I'm lucky Vanna was here. Don't know if you could tell from the shadows, but she basically took the boss monster down by herself," he said, giving her a little smile.

Vanna's cheeks burned again. "No need to try to flatter me about it when that had to be the easiest boss ever."

"Still," Midna said. "...We could be assembling something terrible here. It could be something we'll ultimately have to destroy..."

"Oh well," Vanna said. "We just need it to defeat Zant, right?"

Midna was slow to respond. "...Right." With a sigh, she disappeared into the shadows. "Let me know when you're done, and I'll warp you back to the entrance of the temple."

Things fell into silence, then. Once Vanna had stemmed the bleeding well enough, she got to work stitching up Link's ear. It was slow-going, and definitely not the easiest shape or location of a wound to be stitching up considering it was her first time stitching anything ever, but she thought she was doing an all right job.

"...Would you mind goin' back with me to my place when we're done?" Link asked. "I ... wanna talk to you, now you've got your voice back."

Her heart started to race in anticipation. "About what?"

"About what I promised to tell you. ...About what the fortuneteller said."

Chapter Text

From that moment on, Vanna was a mess of nerves.

Even when they left the temple and they found that the Dominion Rod seemed to be dead in the present day, she was still thinking only about what Link was going to tell her. She'd been dreading this moment, and it was so close.

Before she knew it, they were at Link's house. Much like they had in the temple, they sat together on the floor across from each other. She was sure she was going to start crying and her heart was going to pound out of her chest—the only question was which one would happen first.

"...Why are you nervous?" he asked gently, voice breaking through her spiraling thoughts.

She blinked and looked up at him. "I..."

"It's not bad," he reassured her, offering a light smile.

...Had she gotten it all wrong?

What if what Fanadi had told him didn't have anything to do with her feelings for him after all, and she'd spent all this time freaking out over nothing?

She took a shaky breath, forcing herself to meet his gaze. Link was calm, his expression soft and patient. It didn't help settle her nerves. If anything, it made the air between them feel heavier.

"So... What'd she say?" Vanna asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

He hesitated, rubbing the back of his neck. "She said... She said that—that we both..." Link closed his eyes for a moment, steadying himself, then opened them and looked directly into her eyes with confidence. "She told me that you feel the same way about me as I do about you."

Vanna felt like she short-circuited, trying to process the implications of that statement.

...If he felt the same way about her as she did about him, that would have to mean that he liked her, too.

She'd kept on thinking that he could never in a million years genuinely like her, knowing what she was—that Fanadi had told him the extent of her feelings, and it was his lack of reciprocation that led to him not wanting to talk about what she'd said. She'd never considered, in a million years, that he didn't want to bring up what Fanadi had said because he was nervous to broach the conversation of them being romantically interested in one another.

Somehow, that made everything harder.

She'd thought he would let her down gently. Tell her that Fanadi had told him just how much she had feelings for him, and that he just didn't feel the same way. That he couldn't feel the same way. That he wanted to be with a human, someone he could actually one day start a family with and grow old with.

But now—if he wasn't messing with her—she was going to have to be the one to turn him down. Because, in spite of their apparently mutual feelings, she was the only one aware that a relationship between them would be unfair and wrong. He didn't—couldn't—fully comprehend her, and so she could never accept his feelings as legitimate. How could he agree to being with her when he couldn't truly understand just what he was agreeing to? For her to pretend that he could was taking advantage of his ignorance. Selfish. Unethical. Immoral.

"...Vanna?" Link's voice broke her out of her train of thoughts.

"You can't like me the way I like you," Vanna finally said.

"But I do," he said softly. "I've told you before, Vanna, a thousand times—I don't care what you are."

Tears pricked at her eyes. "That's only because you don't understand what I am."

"I might not understand how every little piece of you works, but I understand you. And that's what matters, not what's inside of you."

"What's inside of me does matter," she said, and the first tear made its way down her cheek as her voice broke. "It's..."

Suddenly thinking of something to make him see, Vanna pushed herself off the floor and went over to his bookshelf. She found the book she wanted and brought it back to him, flipping it open to the page she wanted him to see—a page from The Ancient Robots book he'd shown her before, where there was a drawing of a vaguely humanoid robot.

"Underneath all of this," she said, gesturing to her body and then to the picture, "I'm just, this. I'm metal and wires."

"I know what you are inside. I've seen your heart, Vanna—remember?" Link closed the book and pushed it out of the way, scooting closer to her and reaching out to grab her hands. "Underneath all of this, I'm bones and veins. What can I say to convince you that I really don't see a difference?"

Vanna pulled one of her hands out of his and flipped the book back open, pointing to the drawing again. "Would you still like me if I looked like this?"

"Would you still like me if I looked like a Stalfos?"

She was dumbstruck by that question. Trying to imagine Link as just bones, she ended up thinking of the skeletal face of the Hero's Shade, and how much she'd come to love him.

"...Yes," she admitted. "But I don't think I'd be quite as interested in kissing you."

She couldn't believe she'd seriously just blurted that out. Maybe getting her voice back was a mistake after all.

Link laughed, breaking the tension, and after a few moments, she had to laugh, too. The laughter soon faded into a comfortable silence, though Vanna's cheeks were still burning from her accidental confession. Link's fingers gently curled around hers, his gaze earnest and unwavering.

"Vanna," he began, his voice soft but steady, "I'm telling you, whether or not you're human, I like you. And you obviously like me, too. So what exactly is the problem with us?"

She sighed deeply, trying to put into words the whirlwind of emotions that churned inside her. "The problem is that you don't understand. Like I said."

"If I don't understand, then tell me what to understand. I want to understand."

"I was built, not born," she began softly, her voice trembling.

"...Yeah, I already knew that," he said. "Doesn't change who you are."

"But it does," she insisted. "It changes everything. I can't... I can't live a normal life with you." Another tear slipped down her cheek. "We could never—never have kids or anything, never grow old together... I'm stuck like this. Forever."

He blinked, his brows furrowing slightly. "...I already knew that. We talked about us adopting, didn't we?"

His response threw her off balance, made her eyes widen. "N-not as—not us, together."

"Well, we can. I don't mind," he said with a shrug. Then he reached forward to cup her cheek, and his thumb brushed the tear away, the gesture so tender it sent a warm rush through her chest. "But all that stuff's far off anyway, Vanna. We're still young—we don't gotta be worrying about it yet. Can't we just ... be with each other, now?"

She looked at him, torn between the weight of her fears and the hope in his eyes. "It won't be now forever," she mumbled. Deep down, though, she knew she was speaking against her own heart. Every part of her ached to just say yes—to stop fighting this, to accept that he genuinely liked her and that it was okay.

Link let out a sigh, and his fingers slipped from her cheek, settling gently over her hand again. "...You really are stubborn, you know that?"

She huffed a laugh, but something inside her—some carefully constructed barrier—began to crack with his words. "...I'm sorry," she murmured, unsure of what else to say.

"Don't be—it's one of the reasons I like you," he said with a satisfied smile. Then his expression softened, and his voice took on a quiet, almost reverent tone. "...Can I tell you something else Fanadi told me? Something that might make you feel better about all this?"

Her guard went up again, doubt prickling at her thoughts. "What?"

"She told me she had a vision. A hazy one, but ... she saw us together, in the future. As a family. With kids."

The words hit her with the force of a bomb detonating. She stared at him, wide-eyed, as it sank in.

It sounded so surreal, so far beyond anything she'd allowed herself to imagine. She wanted to believe it—to believe in a future where she could build a life with someone she loved and someone who loved her back. She wanted a future where they could walk through life side by side, where children's laughter echoed through their home and there was more than just the bleak reality of what she was. She wanted it desperately.

"It was far enough out that it couldn't be set in stone," he added, as if to temper the revelation, "but the possibility is there. So, this can work out, Vanna."

Vanna swallowed hard. The vision didn't mean it was guaranteed—but it meant that this wasn't a completely hopeless dream, that the future didn't have to be as somber as she'd feared. Even if she couldn't see how, even if it still felt like an impossible fantasy, the fact that the possibility existed ... that alone was enough.

For a long moment, she couldn't speak. Fresh tears welled up in her eyes, but they weren't the kind that came from despair. They spilled over as she whispered, "...You're serious?"

He gave her a soft, reassuring smile, his eyes widening a touch as he responded, "Yeah, four of 'em."

It took her a second to realize what he meant, and when she did, laughter bubbled out of her. She'd been asking if he was serious about Fanadi's vision—not the number of kids she'd seen.

"Four?" she said, a little incredulous.

"Four," he repeated, grinning.

She laughed harder, her tears spilling freely now, but they felt lighter, cleansing.

For once, hope didn't seem like such a bad thing to have.

"...That make you feel better about us?" he asked, the question sounding rhetorical—like he knew that he'd finally gotten through to her.

"Yeah," she said through the remainder of her laughter.

"I'm glad," he said, voice impossibly gentle.

Link slowly leaned forward. All Vanna could do was watch, heart pounding heavier every second, as he steadily moved in closer to her. He dropped one of her hands again so that he could reach up and cup her face in his palm.

Every fear, every doubt, every wall she'd built up came crashing down when his lips met hers.

His kiss was soft, tentative at first, as if he were giving her every chance to pull away. But she never wanted to. In that instant, nothing else mattered—not the metal and wires beneath her skin, not the uncertainties of their future. There was only him; only them.

Leaning into him, her free hand clutched the fabric of his tunic as though he might disappear if she let go. His kiss deepened, still tender but more certain now, like he was truly convinced that she wasn't going to try to run away from her feelings any longer.

She wasn't sure how long it lasted, but eventually, Link pulled away. He stayed close, his breath warm on her mouth. His pupils were dilated, showing only a small ring of blue iris, and his cheeks were flushed a cute pink.

Just then, Vanna thought of something. "...Did it seriously take Fanadi telling you that our feelings were mutual for you to realize that I like you? Even after I kissed you?"

He sat back further so they could properly see each other. "I just ... thought that since you didn't bring it up anytime after it happened, that either you regretted it, or it didn't really mean anything at all to you," he said, shrugging.

"That's ... dumb."

He chuckled sheepishly. "...Yeah, kinda. But really. I thought it was like that time back in Kakariko Village, by the wagon, when you kissed my cheek after I thanked you. I figured it was just some American custom or something."

"...You know, that whole thing about it being customary to kiss someone on the cheek after a thanks in America—it's not true," she admitted. "Me kissing your cheek was just an impulse. But I was embarrassed afterward, so I came up with that stupid lie."

Link stared at her, wide-eyed, before breaking into a grin. "So you're tellin' me I've been walking around thinkin' your people kiss each other's cheeks all the time after sayin' thanks, and you just made the whole thing up?"

She bit her lip, trying to hold back a laugh. "It wasn't exactly the best lie. I thought you'd figure it out."

"Well, I didn't."

She couldn't hold back anymore—she burst out laughing again. "You're so oblivious."

"Yeah, maybe I am," he said, laughing along with her. "But you're the one who didn't believe me when I said I like you back, so we're both oblivious together."

"I guess we are," she giggled out.

For a moment, the room was filled with nothing but the sound of their laughter.

As it faded out, they found themselves sitting in a comfortable silence. Link was still grinning at her, that soft, sweet smile that always made her heart swell.

He reached out again, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. "So," he murmured, "are you still gonna try and talk me out of liking you?"

Vanna shook her head, a tearful smile growing across her face. "No. I'm done trying."

"Good," he said softly, triumph and affection laced in his voice.

And this time, when he kissed her, there was no hesitation from either of them.

They stayed in Ordon for a bit, having a late lunch with Rusl, Uli, and Elli, and telling Rusl about what they'd found in the ancient temple. When they decided to return to Kakariko Village, they nearly ran into a problem—Midna wouldn't come out of Vanna's shadow. It was only after Vanna yelled for her, in the clearing by Link's house, that Midna came floating over from the woods.

"You scared us," Vanna breathed out. "I thought you died in my shadow or something."

"Nah, you wish you could get rid of me that easily," Midna said through a smile. Her smile quickly vanished, her little nose scrunching up. "I slipped out earlier when you two started getting ... mushy. In the future, if you two ever wanna get up to something, make sure you tell me beforehand so I can get lost."

Vanna's cheeks burned like they were on fire. She wasn't that concerned with the idea that Midna could've heard them back there, where the furthest they went was kissing—after all, Midna had seen them kiss before, in Snowpeak—but her statement about them getting up to something in the future had her mind going places it probably shouldn't have.

"So," Midna continued like she'd said nothing suggestive at all, "where are we going? I still think we should work on restoring magic to the Dominion Rod before starting our search for the mirror shard in the heavens."

Vanna glanced over at Link, seeing that he still had a blush across his face, too. "We just wanted to go back to Kakariko Village, for now," she said. "The next mirror shard can wait."

Midna acquiesced, transforming Link into a wolf and warping them away. Once they reappeared in the bend just before the village, she returned Link to his human form and disappeared into Vanna's shadow.

"I wanna see the Hero's Shade before we go to Zi," Vanna said, starting off toward the graveyard.

"He's back here?" Link asked, falling into step beside her.

"Should be. He was before, waiting on you to come so he could teach you a new skill."

Neither of them said anything else as they walked. As suspected, the Hero's Shade was waiting in his golden wolf form at the far end of the graveyard, the same place he'd been when Vanna had last talked to him a few weeks back. She was suddenly thankful to her past self for not having told Link that he was waiting back here for him—because if Link had gone ahead and learned his next skill, the Shade would no longer be waiting here, and she couldn't question him like she wanted to.

When they approached him, he duplicated himself and lunged at both of them. Vanna's vision faded to white, then to black, and when it reappeared, she was back in her subconscious with only him sitting some feet away from her. Tilting his head back, he howled, and before her eyes transformed.

Even earlier, she'd had trouble trying to reconcile the little boy with him, but actively seeing his skeletal face really made her start to doubt her previous thoughts that they were the same person. She didn't understand how a little boy so cute could someday become ... this.

"We meet again," he said.

"Have you been to the Temple of Time?" she asked, cutting right to the chase.

She could've sworn his single glowing eye glowed brighter for a split second. "...Yes, I have. Have you?"

"I was just there earlier today—but in the past," she said. "Time travel stuff. It was weird."

"I imagine so."

"But anyway..." Vanna took a step closer to him, trying to gather her thoughts. "I saw someone there, in the past. A little boy in green."

He was silent, still, and she again found herself desperate to read the expressions he no longer had.

"...And I remembered seeing an outfit like what he was wearing in the same crate that you had me find your old sword and shield in," she added, her voice quieter.

The silence stretched between them before he finally spoke, his tone low and deliberate. "...You are perceptive."

She took another step forward, her heart pounding. "So... That boy—that really was you? Back when you were alive...?"

He nodded. "Indeed, it was."

Even though she'd started to piece the puzzle together in the first place, it felt like everything finally clicked. She couldn't help but smile. "I can't believe that's what you used to look like. You were so cute!"

The Shade pointedly turned his head away, as if embarrassed. "...Since you have now seen my face, I assume you will no longer ask me to show you what I looked like in life."

She only had to think about it for a second. "Nah. I'd like to see you older than you were then. I'm curious how much you and Link looked alike at the same age."

He sighed. "Very well. I suppose ... there is no longer any reason to hide."

In the blink of an eye, the skeletal figure was gone. In his place stood a man who looked so much like Link that, for a brief moment, Vanna thought it was him.

But it wasn't Link. His hair was a brighter blond parted down the middle instead of off to the side, and his eyes were somehow even bluer, and his face was longer and more angular, and his shoulders were broader, and his outfit wasn't the same... For all the differences between them, minute as some of them may have been, she was surprised at the immediacy with which her mind had—falsely—recognized him.

Vanna stepped even closer to him, eyes soaking in every tiny detail of his face. She wanted to reach out and touch it. "...I don't get it," she murmured.

"What do you not get?" he asked. It was weird, hearing his voice coming out of his living mouth.

"How you and Link look so similar," she said. "You're his great-great-grandfather, right? Four generations back...?

"Yes."

"Some people don't even look that similar to their own parents."

"...I imagine that you have started to have suspicions that you cannot go any further with as a result of your ignorance on spiritual matters, so I will tell you," he said. "Link and I ... are more than just ancestor and descendant. His soul was once mine—and when souls pass from one person to the next, they also pass along physical traits. As Link and I are blood related as well, this effect was magnified."

"So... He's your grandson, and he also is you, just reincarnated?" she asked.

The Hero's Shade answered in the affirmative, and her mind went to their last meeting. When she'd asked him to tell her his name, he'd told her that he had already evinced it to her...

"Your name is Link," she realized aloud. She started to laugh in disbelief. "Your name is Link, because you are Link."

His lips ever-so-slightly curled up, and she just about melted with satisfaction getting to see that she'd made him smile. "Indeed."

She couldn't hold back anymore—she reached out and touched his face, making his eyes widen. "Why wouldn't you tell me before?"

"I did not tell you before for the same reason that I did not show you my face before," he said. "...I knew that one day soon, you would come across me as a child, and not be certain it was me. I was merely waiting for that event to pass in your own timeline. Now, it has—and I've not risked disrupting the flow of time."

She stared at him, the logic of his words slowly sinking in, and she lowered her hand. "So, this wasn't just you being cryptic for the hell of it. You were ... protecting the timeline?"

He nodded. "I have walked the edges of time before. I know its fragility. I could not risk jeopardizing anything by revealing too much too soon. ...However, it was also partially a test—a test of your wits and insights."

"Did I pass the test?" Vanna asked with a little smile.

Again, he nodded—more sincerely and seriously than she would've normally expected in response to what was essentially a joke question. "Yes, you passed."

"And you know, now that I know this stuff, it means I'm going to have to ask you a billion more questions, right?"

"You have a remarkable gift for asking questions," he said, smiling back. "Should you seek more answers, I will not necessarily withhold them from you. However..."

"'However,' what?" she asked, frowning in anticipation. "I'm still gonna have to keep prying every answer out of you like before?"

"No, I will be more forthcoming, so long as the question is one I am comfortable answering now. But I cannot answer more of your questions just yet, for Link has finished learning his new skill. I must bid you farewell."

Her frown deepened. "Wait—already? But there's so much more I wanna ask you!"

"We will meet again soon, Vanna."

And with that, everything before her went white, then black, and she opened her eyes to find herself in the graveyard staring at the empty space where he'd been.

...That was the first time the Hero's Shade had called her by her name—and the first time she realized that she had never told him her name to begin with.

A hand on her shoulder made Vanna jump, and she turned to see Link watching her with a curious expression.

"You okay?" he asked, his brow furrowed. "You look ... upset."

A corner of her mouth raised, and she shook her head. "No, it's just... I just wish I got more time with him is all."

"Should I be jealous of him?" he asked, a mischievous grin on his face.

She nearly snorted with laughter—he wanted to know if he should be jealous of the man who literally was him, at least in a past life. "It'd be hilarious if you were."

They started walking back toward the village together slowly. "So, what do you two usually do when you're together?"

"Lots of talking," she answered.

"He talks a lot?" Link asked, looking at her with a raised brow. "About what?"

"About whatever I ask him to talk to me about," she said, shrugging. "Usually it's about spiritual, soul kinda stuff, since he's a bit of an expert on that."

"What was the topic today?"

She thought about it. She definitely couldn't tell him the full truth; the Hero's Shade wanted to reveal the truth to Link on his own terms, and she didn't want to take the chance away from him. "...We talked about reincarnation," she finally decided to say. It was true—if leaving out a lot of context. Before Link could ask for more, she went on, trying her best to be subtle. "...Do you think you're reincarnated?"

"Yeah. I..." He paused. "You haven't read what's in the front of the notebook I gave you, have you?"

"No...?" she said. "I thought it was your diary."

"It's not a diary, it's a dream journal... 'Cause I think a lot of my dreams are memories of my past lives. But a lot of it's ... conflicting, so I dunno." He shrugged. "That's why I started keeping the journal. I was tryna keep track of things."

"The Hero's Shade told me something once about memories from past lives coming through in dreams," she remembered aloud.

"My ma used to say the same thing," he said. "Anyway, feel free to read it, if you want—maybe you can make more sense of it than I can."

She considered it for a moment, then decided not to wait—she pulled the notebook out and began to read through the front of it as they were still walking, making Link laugh.

"You've been wanting to read it for a while now, huh?" he asked.

"Ever since I first saw it," she admitted.

Since they were on their way to Zi, she only did a quick flip-through, figuring she could sit down and better comb through the pages later. She pretty quickly identified what she thought to be Link's problem when it came to making sense of it—which was that he didn't know how to journal for shit. Even ignoring how a good deal of it was completely illegible scribbles, the decipherable words failed to adequately describe anything. How he thought that merely writing things like 'bird riding' or 'angry nose moon' would help him make sense of anything was beyond her.

She couldn't help but smile, though, as she came across an entry where he wrote that he had a wife with orange hair. It made her wonder if it was in Link's very soul to have a thing for gingers. She'd have to ask the Hero's Shade if his wife had red hair the next time she talked to him.

"Find something interesting?" Link asked, his voice full of teasing curiosity.

She shut the notebook and hugged it to her chest with mock protectiveness. "Nope. Not a thing."

He looked to think about it for a moment, and then he laughed softly. "...I bet I know which one got you smiling."

"Which one do you think it is?" she asked.

"The one about me having a wife with orange hair," he said. When she pursed her lips to try to hide her smile, he grabbed her hand and squeezed it. "Knew it."

"I'll have you know, I was also quite partial to 'talking hat with a beak.'"

He laughed, the sound light and easy, and she laughed along. As the heart of the village came into view, Vanna slipped the notebook back into her pouch. Whatever his past lives had to say, they could wait a while longer—it was time to bask in the now.

Chapter Text

Soon enough, Link and Vanna were entering the Elde Inn. The kids were happy to see them, as usual, but their excitement wasn't as intense as Vanna had anticipated. At first, she couldn't put her finger on why it felt different, but then it hit her—she was expecting the kind of reaction you get after being away for a while, when in reality, they had just seen them this morning. It felt like it'd been far longer than half a day.

Renado, noticing Link's ear and the state of his tunic and chainmail, asked just what they'd gotten ourselves into in the time that they were away. Link didn't give him the full story, but Renado was concerned enough from what he did hear that he had Link sit down to check him out. When Link took all his shirts off, Vanna cringed at the sight of his lower chest. It was a nasty-looking purple. She hadn't considered that Link's chainmail could only save him from the slash, not the brutal force of the hit.

Instead of standing there watching Renado tend to him, she excused herself upstairs, to go ahead and talk to Zi.

Zi was asleep on his bed when she entered.

She hesitated in the doorway, unsure if she should wake him or just go back downstairs—but then she remembered that it was early in the evening and he'd been sleeping in that bed for like two weeks straight.

Sitting on the bed next to him, she reached out to poke his nose. "Zi."

A twitch of annoyance crossed his features. When he didn't stir further, she shifted closer.

"Zi," she repeated in a sharper tone.

This time his eyes shot open, and he pushed himself to sit upright so fast that she almost fell off the edge of the bed.

"Wh-what?" His voice croaked with grogginess, and he blinked at her, disoriented. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong, idiot," she said through a smile. "I was just trying to wake you up."

"...Oh." Zi blinked a few more times and wiped at his eyes, and then his hands suddenly fell back to his lap as he stared at her wide-eyed. Breaking out into a grin, he leaned forward to pull her into a hug. "I told you you could get your voice back!"

"Yeah, yeah, 'you told me so,'" she said lightly, wrapping her arms around him in return. "Guess what else I got back?"

"What?" he asked.

She pulled out of their hug and reached around her back to grab both of their pouches. "Our stuff," she said, dropping the items on his lap.

Zi's eyes lit up at the sight. He grabbed his pouch and opened it, looking down inside it. "...Where's your charger?"

"In my pouch," she said. "I already used it."

"Good," he sighed. He let his pouch drop back into his lap and scooched so he could lean back against the wall. "So—"

"Why the hell were you chasing a giant spider through the woods?" she interrupted him to ask.

He momentarily looked surprised by the sudden question, but he answered it regardless. "It was the boss of the temple down there, with one of the mirror shards—I thought if I took the shard from it, then I could keep it from becoming its boss form," he said, shrugging. "I was just trying to help you guys out, to show you I'm serious about ... everything."

Vanna stared at him.

"...What?"

"You ... seriously ... tried to take a mirror shard?" she said slowly.

He shrugged again. "If I could've gotten it before the boss went into the temple, you guys wouldn't've had to go in there and deal with it."

"Did you not learn about the mirror shards when you were researching the game? They don't just transform monsters into even worse monsters—it could've made you into a monster if you'd gotten it!" she said. "Hell, I'm pretty sure most of the reason you got messed up and were out for as long as you were was just from you being near it. Imagine if you'd—"

"It's fine," Zi interrupted, waving a hand. "I didn't get the shard, and I'm okay now. Right?"

She glared at him for a moment longer before pursing her lips, and then she sighed. There was no point in fighting over what-ifs. "Don't you ever do something stupid like that again. Not without giving me warning first so I can come save your dumb ass."

"Okay, I'll give a warning next time," he said, giving her a lopsided, goofy grin. She rolled her eyes at him, and he went on. "So, I did some more thinking while you guys were gone."

"By 'thinking,' I'm guessing you mean 'dreaming,'" she said.

He pouted. "I only fell asleep a little bit before you got here! Seriously. I had hours to just sit here and think."

"Okay, okay," she said. "What'd you think about?"

"More about ... how to deal with my dad."

"...Please don't tell me you changed your mind."

"No, I'm still going to ... help you kill him." He frowned. "I was just thinking... I gotta set things up at home, first. Make sure everything can go to plan. Like... I gotta make sure that my dad hasn't officially disowned me, since I pissed him off so bad."

"Why would that matter?" she asked. "It's not like... It's not like he's gonna be around anymore."

"Because I have to make sure I'm the one that inherits Ridertech," he said. "If someone else gets in charge, they could follow through with my dad's plan to kill you. If I'm in charge, I get to be the one that gets the final say on what happens with you."

Vanna couldn't help but think of how she should've been the one to get the final say on her own life—but she tried her hardest to focus on just being grateful that there was somebody fighting for her.

"...So, what exactly is the plan?" she asked.

"I go home, make sure I'm still lined up to inherit Ridertech—and then we kill my dad here, where nobody's ever gonna know. Then I can go back home, announce that he died in an accident, and I'll inherit Ridertech, and everything can go back to normal, or normal enough. And you can come home and stay home."

She was taken aback by the thought of finally going back and staying—because she didn't want to.

It was funny how just a few short months ago, she would've done anything to get out of Hyrule, but now just thinking about leaving it upset her. She'd come to love it here—the pace of life, the quiet beauty of the land, and most of all, the people who called it home.

The thought of abandoning it all felt like a betrayal.

"...You okay?" Zi asked.

She realized she'd been staring at the floor. Looking back at him, she nodded. "...Yeah," she said. "It's just ... weird to imagine going back after all this time."

He chuckled in a way that immediately made her know he had no idea what she was feeling. "Yeah, after all this time, you'll finally get to see your family and our friends again, and take a real shower, and sleep in your bed, and play your favorite video games... It's gonna be awesome."

She didn't want to tell Zi how unappealing it still sounded to her. "...As long as I can still come back to visit here," she said, although it was really the other way around in her mind—staying here, visiting there.

He blinked at her. "...You know my dad promised to release one of the NEVAs to the government once you're secured, and the others are to be destroyed."

A wave of emotion crashed over Vanna as she took in the implications of his statement—implications that he wasn't going to fight that decision. "But—but you're gonna be in charge now! Can't things be different? Or—can't we just tell them that we destroyed them, but secretly keep them?"

Zi grimaced, scrunching his nose. "If it was any other piece of tech, then maybe, but this is ... a big deal. Bigger than anyone in charge of Ridertech. They're gonna want proof that the other NEVAs were destroyed—and if not, they're gonna wanna take them for themselves to destroy. This isn't a battle we can win, Vanna. I'm sorry."

His words hit her like a punch to the gut, and for a moment, she couldn't find the strength to respond.

"...I won't go back," she said under her breath.

Zi frowned. "What was that?"

"I said..." Vanna closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "I said, I won't go back. Not if I can't ever return here."

He didn't respond at first. When she opened her eyes, he was looking at her like she was crazy.

"You would give up everything ... to stay here?" Zi asked.

She nodded resolutely.

"But you can't," he said, eyes wide. "You staying here—it's like a human staying in a world without a doctor. At some point, something's gonna go wrong, and you're gonna need help, and nobody in this world will be able to help you."

"Oh well," she said with nonchalance that she didn't truly feel.

"Vanna..." Zi said, his voice softer now.

He reached out to grab her hand, but she pulled it away. Tears started to prickle at her eyes, and she blinked them away, shaking her head.

"...No," she said. "We're not talking about this right now. We're not ... ruining my day."

"Okay," he said slowly. "Guess we can talk about this later, then, but..." After he trailed off, he raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean about ruining your day, though? Is killing giant monster spiders your idea of a good day, now?"

"I didn't mean that part," she muttered, feeling her cheeks heat up.

Zi squinted at her. "Okay... So what part did you mean?" he pressed, his curiosity practically oozing from his voice.

She hesitated. Was it a good idea to tell him, right after he'd just announced that his plans involved her leaving Hyrule forever, that she'd gone and gotten herself so attached to someone from here?

"...It's Link, isn't it?" he said.

Vanna froze. Her cheeks burned hotter, and she quickly looked anywhere but at Zi.

Her silence must have been answer enough. "Oh my god," he said. "You and Link?"

She crossed her arms defensively, her lips pressing into a thin line. "Shut up."

"But he's...!" Zi trailed off, then tilted his head and made a face as if considering something seriously. "I didn't think you'd ever settle for a guy so short."

Vanna burst out laughing, realization dawning on her that this wasn't going the way she'd feared it would. Zi wasn't upset with her for forming attachments to this world, he wasn't incredulous that she'd managed to snag Link in spite of the way she was...

He was sincerely thinking about this just like anybody would upon hearing that their best friend was in a new relationship.

"I don't care how short he is," she said. "I care that he's ... him."

"Well, isn't that just ... nauseatingly sweet."

She rolled her eyes, still smiling, and lightly smacked his leg. "You sound like Midna. She won't knock off the fake-sick thing when it comes to us."

"Who said I was faking it?" Midna said.

Vanna jumped, looking down at her shadow, while Zi laughed. "How long have you been here?!" she said.

"The whole time? You know I prefer your shadow."

"You could've got lost," Vanna said, repeating Midna's verbiage from earlier in the day.

"Yeah, but I didn't think you'd end up talking about you and Link being all mushy now—I just wanted to hear more about you and Zi's plan." Midna popped out of Vanna's shadow, then, a smirk on her face. "And speaking of that plan, I thought I'd let you know I'm willing to help."

"You're welcome to," Zi said. "But I think we should let Vanna be the one to ... y'know."

Be the one to kill his dad, he couldn't make himself finish saying.

And just like he couldn't make himself finish even saying it, Vanna couldn't imagine if she could actually do it.

Fantasizing about it in an abstract way had been cathartic to her before, but imagining it as if she were actually doing it—blood pouring out of him, her blade in his lifeless body, its hilt in her hand—made her recoil.

It was beyond justifiable anymore, that much she could not deny. She had the right to do everything in her power to defend herself. But still...

"Anyway," Zi said, trying to keep his tone upbeat, "I think I should probably get going back home now. It's already been like three weeks since ... everything, right?"

"Don't you think you need more time to recover?" Vanna asked. "You're still weak. You just woke up today."

"That's exactly why I gotta go now," he said, reaching into his pouch to grab one of the NEVAs and slipping it onto his wrist. "I don't wanna give my dad any more time to write me out of the will, if he hasn't yet. If I'm not next in line to run Ridertech, my plan falls apart."

Without waiting for Vanna to say anything, Zi pushed himself off the bed to stand up. He was a bit wobbly, and his clothes still hung too loosely on his frame.

She knew there was no stopping him, though.

"Just be careful," she sighed.

"Don't worry, Van. I got this. My plan's even more thought out than I told you. It'll all be fine, I promise." He winked at her, raising his arms to type into his NEVA.

And then he was gone in the blink of an eye, leaving Vanna alone in the room with Midna.

It was Midna who finally broke the silence. "...You know he's probably gonna try something stupid, right?"

"Yeah," Vanna breathed out. "But he wouldn't be Zi if he didn't."

"He's gone?"

Vanna turned to look at the doorway at the voice. Link was standing there, back in just his underclothes. Renado must've finished tending to him.

"Just left," she said. "I don't think he should be gone for very long, but he also apparently didn't tell me his full plans, so I don't know."

Link came over to sit down on the bed next to her, and as soon as he did Midna said, "All right, I'm out," and made for the window.

"We're just sittin' here," Link said.

"Yeah, for now," Midna said. "See you later!"

With that, Midna slunk into her shadow form and slipped out through the window. Vanna rolled her eyes and sighed.

"So..." Link started. "I overheard a bit from downstairs, but not too much, 'cause of the kids talkin'. What plans did he tell you about?"

"He's going home right now to make sure he's still next in line to inherit his dad's company—that way, once we kill his dad, he'll have the final say in what happens with me, and he won't let anybody kill me." Vanna looked down at her fingers in her lap, fiddling them together. "...But he wants me to go back. And stay back."

"Why?" Link asked, like he'd just been punched in the gut—the same way she felt at Zi's words. "I get him wanting you to get to go back, but why's he think you gotta stay? Why can't you just keep goin' back and forth as you want to, just like he's been doin' this whole time?"

"Because we're supposed to hand over one of the NEVAs to the government, and the two others are to be destroyed, remember?" she said. "So, if I'm over there when they're taken away..."

"...You'll have no way to come back to me," Link finished for her somberly. His brow furrowed as he sat in silence for a moment, his gaze fixed on the floor. When he finally looked up at her, his expression was hopeful. "What about the original one?"

"The original what?" she asked.

"The original NEVA—the one that Midna broke," he said, reaching to grab one of her hands. "...That she promised to bring back."

Their original deal. Vanna had all but forgotten about it when she'd realized that it wasn't safe for her to go back. But now... "They won't ask to destroy it, because they think it already has been destroyed! I can go back and forth whenever I want to!" she realized, grinning wildly.

Link grinned with her, and she threw herself at him for a hug. He wrapped his arms tightly around her in return. "You don't have to choose," he said softly.

"This is the only time you'll ever hear me say this..." Vanna started, voice muffled by his shoulder. "...But thank the Goddesses for Midna."

When it became clear that Zi was going to take his time, Link and Vanna went back downstairs to the lobby where Renado, Luda, Beth, and Ilia were sitting around. They were all—except maybe Ilia—glad to hear that she got her voice back, and she was equally as glad to finally get to properly talk to them all again.

...Except maybe Ilia.

Vanna tried to tell herself that it more than likely had nothing to do with her, but she couldn't help but wonder if she was the cause of Ilia's downtrodden mood. Ilia had definitely looked bothered when Link had chosen to pull up a stool and sit right next to her. Maybe it was obvious that her and Link had something more going on now, and Ilia was jealous... Just like Vanna had been jealous of her, back when she'd thought that Ilia and Link had something going on. The only difference was that Ilia was right to be jealous if she was, and Vanna hadn't been.

It was precisely because Vanna was paying more attention to Ilia, trying to read her, that she was the first to notice when something happened.

Link and Vanna had been taking turns recounting bits and pieces of what had transpired in regards to visiting the ancient temple, and an offhand mention of the Dominion Rod set Ilia off. Her eyes widened suddenly, and she stared blankly at the table in front of her.

"Ilia...?" Vanna said.

Ilia looked up at her, eyes still wide. "I remember something," she mumbled.

Renado was immediately at attention. "What is it?"

"I was... I was..." Ilia's eyes shot back and forth in front of her, looking at something that wasn't really there. "I was with someone—someone who saved me—and they told me all about a rod. A rod of the heavens. I'm... I'm certain it's the same rod."

"Fortune has smiled upon us," Renado said. "This rod may perhaps finally be the key to unlocking your memories."

At that, Vanna reached into her pouch and pulled out the decrepit Dominion Rod, and sat it on the table in front of Ilia. "It's looking a little rough right now," she said, "but—"

"That's it!" Ilia yelled, slamming her hands on the table and rising from her seat. "They told me that the rod would be damaged ... but that they knew how to fix it." She settled back down, face falling and hands going up to grasp the hair on the sides of her head. "Ugh! Why can't I remember anything else?!"

"Breathe, Ilia," Renado calmly instructed, placing a hand softly on her back.

Ilia let out a shaky breath, closing her eyes and loosening her grip on her hair. Renado seemed to anchor her, and after a moment, her hands fell into her lap.

"Start from what you do remember," Renado encouraged gently, voice steady and soothing. "You mentioned someone who saved you. What do you remember about this person? Anything at all."

Ilia's gaze drifted back to the rod on the table. "They ... they found me. I was so scared... I didn't know where I was, or what was happening, just that it was dangerous. But this person... They kept me safe." Her eyes grew distant, her voice quieter as she continued. "They didn't have to help me, but they did. They ... helped me get to safety. But then..." Ilia's brows knit together, eyes starting to widen again. "They could've come with me, but they refused. They stayed there. In danger."

"Maybe they handled the danger by themselves!" Beth piped up.

Ilia shook her head. "No... No. They couldn't have." Her voice cracked, her expression clouded with worry and guilt. "What if they're still there? It—it's been months, they could be—!"

"Dwelling on thoughts such as those will not bring you clarity," Renado said. "Instead, focus on what you do remember. Perhaps there are clues in these fragments—clues that could lead us to ensuring the safety of your savior, and bring you that much closer to regaining all your memories."

"What'd the place you were in look like?" Link asked. "We've been all over Hyrule the past few months. We might be able to recognize it."

"It was..." Ilia tilted her head, narrowing her eyes. "It ... reminds me of here. Of Kakariko Village."

Vanna couldn't think of anywhere they'd been that was anything like Kakariko Village—unless, perhaps, all Ilia remembered was the dirt, and it was somewhere over in the Gerudo Desert. "The desert to the west?" she suggested.

"No... It was up north. More north than Castle Town."

"And it was a village much like this...?" Renado said, and Ilia nodded. "...I may know where you're talking about."

"Really?!" Ilia said.

Renado nodded. "Long ago, there was a tribe that protected the Hylian Royal Family, that lived their lives in secrecy... I've heard that they dwindled in numbers throughout the war, but some remained in their hidden village—and some outsiders know where the village is. Goron elder Gor Coron has spoken to me of it before."

"Can you speak to him more?" Ilia asked, looking up at him pleadingly. "I... I wanna go there. Maybe seeing it will spark my memory!"

"Did you not say that the one who saved you stayed behind in danger?" Renado asked in return. "If they remained in danger in their village, I believe it would not be wise for you to go to such a dangerous place again."

"We can go," Link offered. "Whatever danger's there—we can take care of it. Right, Vanna?"

"Right," Vanna said, nodding and giving him a little smile.

But Ilia didn't look too pleased, considering they were talking about potentially saving somebody that she'd seemed desperate to have saved. "I ... suppose you two can," she said. "...But after the danger is taken care of, can you take me there with you?"

"It's a long journey," Renado said. "And one that would be fraught with danger, regardless of whether or not Link and Vanna take care of the danger in the village itself."

Ilia sighed. "But—"

"Hey, Vanna," a voice called, urgent, from above.

Looking up at the loft overlooking the lobby, Vanna saw Zi standing there, his features marred with concern.

"Sorry to interrupt anything," he said, "but I gotta talk to you."

Vanna looked at Link, then got up and went quickly up the stairs. Zi grabbed her wrist and practically dragged her back into the bedroom, and he shut the door.

"My dad's gone," he said.

"What?" she said, her heart immediately starting to race. "What do you mean by 'gone'? Is he...?"

"I don't know," he said. "He's been missing for a month—since the day you ... escaped. The last time he was seen was right after he came back from looking for you in the snowy mansion—he grabbed a gun and told his NEVA to teleport him back to Hyrule."

"And there hasn't been a trace of him since...?" she asked.

"Not in America, no. And the COO of Ridertech had to step up since both me and my dad have been gone, and Ridertech is officially trying to deny that anything's happening, but the media's been going crazy 'cause they know we've been missing, and—"

"But you're sure there hasn't been a trace of him?" she asked again, unable to truly believe it.

"Yes," Zi said. "He was caught on Ridertech security footage telling his NEVA to teleport him to Hyrule, and the second he left is the second that his location stopped pinging from his phone. He's not in America, and he hasn't been in America."

"Okay," she said slowly, trying to organize the spinning thoughts in her head. "So... He's here."

"But it's been a month. And he hasn't found you, when he came here looking for you. And you've basically just been in this village the whole time, haven't you?" he said, and she nodded. "So why the hell hasn't he found you yet? Where the hell is he?"

"...Maybe he got killed by a monster in some remote part of Hyrule," she said. It was wishful thinking, but it was also a very real possibility.

"He had a laser gun, though," Zi said, frowning. "I think a laser gun could take out just about any monster in this world easily. I'm worried ... I'm worried his NEVA malfunctioned and brought him to a different world or something. Someplace a gun couldn't save him. Because he knows that here and home are connected timewise, so he would never just let a month pass here. Shit, that's part of the reason he had me looking for you in the first place—he didn't want to leave behind Ridertech for too long. There's no reason for him not to have come home yet, unless something happened to him."

"That's ... kind of what we wanted though, isn't it?" she asked. "For something to happen to him."

"But we need to know for sure that something happened to him before we go on with our plan—'cause what if we go back home, and then he finally manages to get home? You'll be dead, Vanna."

"Yeah..." she said with a grimace. She hadn't thought about that. "...I think he is in this world, though. I mean, when my NEVA malfunctioned in the first place, it sent sparks everywhere and shocked me. Nothing like that happened with him when he told his NEVA to take him back to Hyrule, right?"

"No. It just looked like a normal teleportation on the security cam footage." He paused, and sighed heavily. "...I guess we just gotta look for him, then. And once we find him..."

"If he's not already dead, we kill him."

Zi's jaw tightened, and he nodded.

"So, what now?" she asked. "Are you going back home to settle things out more, or are we gonna start looking for him right away?"

Pursing his lips, he considered it. "...If it's already been a month, I don't think we gotta be in much of a rush to find him. But I do wanna go back home to settle things out some more. ...And to get a shower. I don't know how you can handle living in this world." He frowned suddenly. "You were serious, earlier? About staying here...?"

Thinking back to her conversation with Link, Vanna hesitated. She definitely wasn't going to remind Zi that Midna could bring back the original NEVA. If she got it back, it would be her secret—so she could go back with him, and return here whenever she wanted to, all without him even knowing.

She finally decided to try to make it seem like she was having doubts, so he wouldn't be surprised later on if she did tell him she was going back with him. "I'm... I'm not sure."

For the first time since he'd returned, he lightened up. "I... I know it'll be hard for you to say goodbye to this world, but really, Vanna—it's for the best that you come home."

"I know," she mumbled.

Sighing, Zi closed the distance and wrapped his arms around her, and she snaked her arms up around his back in return.

"...Before you go," she started, pulling her head back enough to look up at him. "...You did do a lot of research on the game, right?"

"Yeah...?" Zi said. "Why?"

"I was wondering... Since we're not in a rush to find your dad here or anything—do you think you could help us get Ilia's memory back? I'm guessing she does in the game, and you should know how it happens."

"Oh," he said. "Sure. Actually, I think I remember reading that you can totally skip over getting her memory back."

Vanna rolled her eyes. "We want her to get her memory back, Zi."

"Who's 'we'? I don't really care if she gets her memory back or not," he said—and she smacked his back. "I was just playing! ...I'll help. But I gotta go back home and look into it some more, 'cause I only really paid attention to parts I thought could lead me to you when I was researching."

"Thank you."

"I'm not sure how much help I'll be, though. You know the game and reality don't always line up."

"I know, but still, it can't hurt to try." Vanna pulled away from him. "Now go home and take your shower. You stink."

Chapter Text

"...What exactly did Ooccoo say about the Dominion Rod when we came out of the Temple of Time?" Vanna asked Link. "I was kinda ... distracted."

"So was I," Link responded, smiling, "but it was something about there being a spell to restore magic to the rod."

Because Link had recognized the bells in the Temple of Time that had transported Buddy from place to place, having seen one in the cellar of Renado's sanctuary, he wanted to visit it with the Dominion Rod to see if anything would happen—but both the rod and the bell remained as they were, neither seeming to react to the other's presence.

"I could always just ask Zi whenever he gets back," she said. "He's researched this ... story, a lot. And he's gonna be researching it even more now, because earlier I asked him if he could help us use what he knows to get Ilia's memory back."

Link's expression softened. "You really did that...?"

"Might as well make use of Zi knowing what happens ahead of time, right?" she said with a shrug. "But, speaking of Ilia... I wanna talk to you about her."

"What about her?"

Vanna hesitated, searching for the right words. It felt like it was too soon to bring up something rooted in jealousy, but she wanted to get it out there. "I ... I know she has a thing for you," she said, trying to rip the bandage off.

He stared at her, looking like she'd spoken to him in a foreign language. "Ilia? She ... what?"

"She likes you," she said plainly.

He opened his mouth to respond, then closed it, his brow furrowing in deep thought. Finally, he said, "She told you that?"

"No. It's just obvious that she does. Maybe not to you, but..." Vanna shrugged again. She swallowed hard, contemplating saying what she had next in mind. It was something she'd been curious about forever. "And I was just wondering... You really ... never liked her back, did you?"

"Not like that, no," he said firmly.

Relief mingled with embarrassment as she looked down at the ground, kicking at a loose stone. "You're sure?"

Link tilted his head, giving her an amused look. "Yes, I'm sure. You've got no reason to be jealous of her."

Her face tingled at being called out so bluntly. "How was I supposed to not be jealous, though? It seemed like you two were, like, meant to be in the story or something," she said, folding her arms across her chest. "You grew up together. You were close."

Link sighed, leaning against the cellar wall. "I'll admit, I did used to think we'd end up together someday. But do you remember what I told you before, when we were talkin' 'bout Kira? About how when you grow up in a tiny village with only a few people, it's like your life is laid out for you? That's how it all was with Ilia. She was the only girl the same age as me—I didn't think I had any other option."

"But you didn't actually like her like that...?" she asked.

Link shook his head, his expression earnest. "No, I didn't, and I still don't. I care about her, of course, but it's not ... like that. It never has been. Not for me, anyway."

"If it was never like that, then why did you think you'd end up with her?" she asked. "I mean, I get her being the only girl in your village around your age ... but she could've just as easily ended up with Fado instead of you."

He shrugged. "It was what everyone around us was rootin' for—our parents and other folks all thought we'd make a cute couple as kids. And I thought I didn't have a choice but to go along with what everybody else thought."

"So you've been a pushover all your life," she said teasingly.

He rolled his eyes with a playful smile. "Maybe a little bit. But really... You got nothing to be jealous of. Promise," he said, taking her hand in his. "But, honestly? If Ilia does like me, I'd bet it's just 'cause of her memory loss. She's ... tryna cling to what she thinks her life was like beforehand. Once she remembers everything, I think it'll all sort itself out."

"You really think so? Because..." She hesitated again. "...You know, you're kind of impossible not to like."

He laughed, the sound warm and genuine, and it made her heart flutter. "I don't know about that," he said. "But if Zi can help her, then we'll figure out the rest after that. I'll talk to her when the time comes, if I have to—let her down nicely and all that."

"Okay," she breathed out. "Good."

"Now, I got somethin' to ask you."

"...I swear, if you ask me if I ever liked Zi—"

"No, no," he said through a grin. "I was just gonna ask—since you finally got your bow back, do you wanna go up to break that dam for the lady up by Zora's Domain? The one that looks like your sister's girl? We promised her we would come back, and then we kinda left her hanging."

Oops.

Iza was surprisingly okay that they'd left her hanging—or, she at least pretended to be for Link's sake. Breaking up the dam for her was quick enough work with bomb arrows. After the deed was done, she made a new request; she asked them to take a ride down the river to clear out any other blockages that had formed along the way.

The river was long—far longer than Vanna expected it to be—and, according to Link, absolutely horrendous to try to navigate in their canoe. He was so bad at paddling it that it was almost hilarious. She couldn't even be mad the few times they banged into the cave walls around them.

At last, a long drop down a waterfall left them in Lake Hylia, and the Zora who'd been trailing them collected the canoe once they were out of it. Standing beside Vanna, Link's expression was a mixture of relief and subtle frustration—probably replaying every collision with the rocks in his head. She had to stifle a grin. With him usually being calmly competent, seeing him so humanly flawed was ... endearing.

The sun was beginning to set, leaving the basin in shadow. Link asked if she was ready to return to Kakariko Village to finally end the night, and she nodded.

Once Midna had warped them back and returned Link to his human form, they walked around the bend into the village. Vanna's eyes went right to the shack she'd claimed.

Any other day, she would've only been a little bit flustered at the thought of asking Link to stay with her overnight in the shack—but now that they were actually together, it seemed a little too forward, even if she didn't intend for it to be.

She slowed to a stop as they neared it. "Hey. Would you ... stay with me?" she asked, then quickly tacked on, "Like you did last night."

"Sure," he said, and there was no hesitation in his voice, no awkwardness—just straightforward sincerity. "But do you wanna go check back at the inn and see if Zi came back yet, first?"

"Yeah, that's probably a good idea."

He followed along beside her to the inn, where they found that Zi hadn't returned yet. As they made their way back to the shack, she thought about last night, when they'd shared the bed in there ... and how she'd noticed that his heart was beating in time with hers. She couldn't believe that she hadn't thought anything of it, hadn't figured out that it meant something.

And tonight was much the same. For how unaffected he'd acted earlier when she'd asked him to stay the night with her, she felt his heart racing when she laid her head against his chest. Its rate picked up even more when he moved to wrap his arms gently around her back.

Vanna was roused in the morning by the sound of the doorknob twisting open, followed by sunlight beginning to spill into the shack. She stirred, squinting against the light. Her head was still on Link's chest, and his arm had remained draped protectively over her during the night.

A figure, backlit with the morning sun, appeared in the doorway. "Aww, aren't you two cute?"

Her eyes shot wide open, and she bolted upright, stirring Link. Standing there, arms crossed and a smirk across his face, was Zi. He leaned casually against the doorframe, his sharp eyes darting between her and Link.

"Zi," she groaned, running her hands through her hair.

Beside her, Link grunted in a groggy protest as he pushed himself up.

"At least you guys are dressed," Zi teased, stepping inside and closing the door behind him. "I'm not interrupting anything, am I?"

"Our sleep," Link grumbled.

"Oh. Sorry. I thought getting your ex-girlfriend's memory back was more important."

Vanna restrained herself from throwing a pillow at Zi, while Link just looked at him confusedly. Understanding dawned on Link's features after a moment.

"Ilia was never my girlfriend," he said.

"But you still want her to get her memories back, right?" Zi asked. He didn't wait for either of them to answer. "So, I looked into how it went in the game. I'm guessing you guys already talked to Renado, but have you dropped off the letter to Telma yet?"

"...What letter to Telma?" Vanna asked.

Zi stared at her blankly. "...Renado was supposed to give you a letter to give to Telma, about how to get Ilia's memory back."

"Um. Maybe he was gonna do that soon...?" she said. "You might as well just tell us how the game handles it. Even if things don't match up completely, at least we'll have something to go on."

He went on to describe in detail the game's sequence of events for getting Ilia's memory back—taking the letter to Telma, Telma sending Link to the town's doctor who had seen Ilia, Link tracking down the scent of some carving that Ilia had, giving the carving back to Ilia, Ilia regaining a small part of her memory...

"That part already happened," Link said. "Yesterday, she remembered some stuff about the person who saved her... But none of the other stuff you mentioned happened before that."

"Huh," Zi said. "...Then I guess you guys can skip right to going to the Hidden Village. One of the Gorons is supposed to go with you to help you get in."

"Yeah, Renado said he'd set that up yesterday after you called Vanna upstairs."

Zi blinked a few times before raising an eyebrow at her. "...Why'd you even ask for my help if you guys were basically already done?"

"How was I supposed to know we're basically already done if I don't know how things are supposed to go?" she said. "And besides, we might not even be basically already done, considering how different other things related to this have been in real life. What happens at the Hidden Village in the game?"

"You save this little old lady who saved Ilia, and she gives you this charm that Ilia had on her, and the charm makes Ilia regain the rest of her memories," Zi said, ending off with a shrug. "So, like I said—you basically skipped right near the end."

"...If it's as simple as that, maybe you didn't need to come barging in this morning," she said.

"But I did! 'Cause while I was researching, I realized something else." Zi plopped on the bed with them, brimming with excitement. He looked at Link, eyes gleaming. "...Don't you have a piece of the Triforce?"

Vanna's eyes immediately went to the mark on the back of Link's hand, before looking at his face to see if he knew where Zi was going with this. She only had bits and pieces of knowledge about the Triforce. She knew it was from the Sacred Realm, that Midna's ancestors had tried to steal it so they could rule that realm, and Link and Ganondorf had each inherited a piece—but that was it. Judging by Link's expression, he already knew what Zi was getting at.

But he frowned quickly afterward. "And use it to what, exactly?" he asked, even though it sounded like he knew.

"Save Vanna. Duh."

"But—"

"Wait, hold on," she interjected. "What does 'using' the Triforce even mean?"

Zi was the one to respond. "Link can correct me if I get anything wrong, but when all three pieces are together, whoever touches it gets to make a wish on it—any wish—and it'll come true."

Her pulse quickened. If it made any wish come true, and she could get her hands on it...

Merely saving her life seemed almost trivial compared to what she truly wanted—to become human.

Link seemed to read her thoughts. "...You shouldn't get your hopes up," he said to her softly. "We'll only get one wish ... and if I need to use it to get rid of Zant or Ganondorf for good, then that's it. The Triforce will return to the Sacred Realm, back where it belongs."

"Oh," she said, her voice barely a whisper.

If there was only one wish, then...

"Pretty sure you don't need it to get rid of either of them," Zi said. "'Least, you didn't in the game."

"It's been wrong before," Link retorted.

"It's been right even more often," Zi shot back.

"Even if we don't need it to get rid of them..." she said, "if we only get one wish—one wish for anything—I wouldn't ... I wouldn't want to use it on me. It'd be a waste."

Link frowned at her. "Wishing for you to live would not be a waste, Vanna. It's just that ... if they live, nobody lives, so they have to go first."

"It is a waste when you can wish for anything you want," she said.

"What I want is for you to live."

"But you can wish for anything!" she repeated, exasperated. "What about Colin? Your parents? World peace!"

"Colin and my parents are in a better place now," Link said. "It would be cruel to rip them out of heaven. But you..."

But she was still alive. And it wasn't like she could go to heaven anyway—not without something like the Triforce.

She didn't have time to get herself down much about that thought, though, because Zi made a quiet noise that brought her attention to him. When she looked at him, he was visibly confused.

"Colin's...?" he started quietly. "...Colin's ... dead?"

"He died a few months back," she said softly.

With the look on Zi's face, she instantly knew that Colin hadn't died in the game.

It didn't take long for Link to come to the same conclusion. "...He wasn't supposed to die?"

"Oh, so now the game version is how it's all 'supposed' to go," Zi said without humor.

That opened up a whole new series of possibilities in Vanna's head for her to worry about. She'd previously been banking on the game and reality lining up at least when it came to major things—but if they differed on something so major as whether a child lived or died, what else could be different? What if Midna couldn't get her power back? What if Link couldn't defeat Ganondorf?

"...I'm sorry," Zi finally said, breaking the tense silence they'd been in. "...But at least he's in a better place, now, right?"

"Right," Link sighed out—but despite his agreement, he couldn't keep the sadness off his face.

Zi slowly pushed himself off the bed, making it creak with his movement. "So... Um. I guess... I guess I'll leave you two alone, now. I just wanted to tell you that stuff before setting out to go look for my dad."

As Vanna wondered how in the hell Zi would even begin his search for his dad, something came to her. "Why don't you go to the fortune teller first?" she suggested. "She can let you know if we'll even be able to find your dad in the first place."

"That lady in Castle Town?" Zi asked, and she nodded. "All right, I'll talk to her. But if it turns out to be a scam like the 'fortune tellers' in our world are..."

"She's legit," she said. "Kinda ... vague, sometimes, but still."

"All right, I'll check her out. See you two ... back here, at some point." Zi raised his wrist with NEVA on it. "NEVA, activate. Teleport: Castle Town base."

With that, Zi vanished.

Link rubbed his eyes before standing and getting all his clothes and gear back in place. "Let's go see if Renado's talked to the Gorons."

"All right..."

Stepping outside the shack with Link at her side and looking down toward Renado's sanctuary, Vanna saw Renado, Gor Coron, and Darbus all out in the street together. She wondered for a brief moment why they were talking outdoors on a chilly morning when they only had to step a few feet over to go into the sanctuary, but then she realized that Darbus' hulking form likely couldn't fit through the doors. There was also a horse standing nearby—one she didn't recall ever seeing before.

Once Link and Vanna approached them, Renado confirmed that he was indeed talking to the Gorons about how to get to the Hidden Village. It was nestled into a narrow canyon, much like Kakariko Village, but the only entrance to the village was a cave that had been blocked off by a rockslide. That was why Gor Coron had brought along Darbus; he was the only one strong enough to break apart the rocks and let them get through into the village.

As Link discussed logistics with them, Vanna was only somewhat paying attention. Apparently, the plan was for Darbus to roll his way to the village by himself, and since it would take a while for 'tiny humans' to walk all the way there, she and Link had to find some other way of following him. Renado suggested that they speak to Shad—who'd arrived in the village early this morning to study the bell in the sanctuary's cellar as part of his research of the heavens—if they could borrow his horse for the trip, since they didn't have Epona with them. All the while, her mind was caught on their discussion of the Triforce.

Once the arrangements were settled, Darbus took off rolling at a crazy speed down the length of the village, and Link and Vanna got onto Shad's horse and followed after the trail Darbus left in his wake.

"So..." Vanna ventured, once they were out of the village and into the field north of it. "I was thinking ... about what Zi said. About the Triforce."

Link tensed in front of her. "What about it?"

"You knew, didn't you?" she said. "That I could wish on it to become human. It wasn't news to you when Zi brought up using it for me."

"...Yeah," he quietly admitted. "I thought about it ... pretty much right when I first found out how much it upset you to not be a human."

"Why didn't you ever tell me?" she asked, though there was no accusation in her tone—only curiosity.

He hesitated. "...Two reasons," he finally said. "First... I don't know if we can afford to use it for that. Like I said back there, if I need the Triforce to stop Zant or Ganondorf for good, that has to come first. I can't risk using it for something else unless I'm absolutely sure they can be defeated without it—and I won't be sure until it's time to go against them."

"And the second reason...?"

Link let go of one of the reins for a brief moment to place his hand over hers where she was holding onto him. "Because… I wanted you to see yourself the way I do—for you to accept yourself as you are. And I was afraid that if you'd known there was something out there that could turn you human, you'd never even try to accept yourself."

She froze at his words, a strange mix of emotions twisting in her chest.

His hand squeezed hers briefly before returning to the reins. "And I think you have been accepting yourself more," he continued, his tone soft but certain. "The Vanna I knew when she first found out never woulda been okay with us bein' together."

She breathed out a short laugh. "I was still fighting us being together yesterday."

"But you stopped," he countered gently. "You didn't want to fight it anymore—and that's what matters. Before, you woulda kept pushing me away."

"...Probably," she eventually agreed. "But... I don't think that really has much to do with me accepting what I am. I accepted what I am pretty much as soon as I found out—I just ... never liked it."

"Whatever you wanna call it—accepting or liking... I wanted you to have the chance for it," he said. "So that's why I didn't tell you before."

Vanna was quiet for a moment, mulling over his words and the sincerity in them. "...Thank you," she finally said, her voice soft.

Link glanced over his shoulder, a little surprised. "For ... not telling you about the Triforce?"

"For wanting me to be okay with myself," she said. "Even if I'm not, still—even if I don't ever think I really can be ... it means a lot that you've always wanted that for me."

The ride to the Hidden Village was treacherous, especially so the nearer they got to it. As they wound their way deeper into the rugged terrain, monsters loomed on the jagged cliffs above, raining projectiles at them. While Link deftly steered the horse to avoid the onslaught, Vanna nocked her own arrows and shot at the monsters in rapid succession.

They finally reached the valley where the Hidden Village was located, its walls rising high on either side. Some way into it, Darbus's trail suddenly ended. Link brought the horse to a stop. With the cessation of its clopping footsteps against the hard earth, they could hear it—a deep, rhythmic grunting echoing from within the valley walls, followed by the crunching and smashing of rock. The noise was coming from a shadowy opening in the valley walls.

Dismounting the horse, they entered the cave, and soon found Darbus standing in the middle of a pile of rubble, his huge hands lifting and smashing rocks with ease. The air in the cave was thick with dust, illuminated by beams of sunlight piercing through the cracks of the rockslide he was breaking his way through. As he smashed through one of the holes, opening it up enough that Link and Vanna could easily walk through, he finally realized they were behind him. He straightened up, brushing the stone dust off his gargantuan chest.

"Tiny humans!" he boomed, his voice echoing off the cave walls. He gestured toward the opening with a satisfied, huge grin. "The way is clear enough for you to enter. But before you go rushing in, listen up." His smile then rapidly faded, replaced by a scowl. "The scent of evil has been burning my nostrils... A small band of beasts must have settled into the village—at most, twenty of them. You little humans will be more than enough to take care of them. But you must defeat them all to save that girl's benefactor."

If Link thought anything was weird about Darbus apparently being able to smell that there were a maximum of twenty beasts ahead, he said nothing about it. He just thanked Darbus for clearing the way and told him that they could handle it from here. Darbus squeezed back into the walls of the cave to let them pass through the opening then, and once they'd passed through, Vanna heard the sound of him rolling away.

The Hidden Village was like something out of an old Wild West movie, a ghost town frozen in time. Rickety wooden buildings with faded signs and broken windows lined either side of the single dusty street. Vanna was about to break the silence to say something about how abandoned it looked when she noticed movement in the distance. Up on one of the balconies, a Bulblin was patrolling.

"...Where are they?" Link asked, keeping his voice low.

"There's one right there, walking on the balcony," she said, pointing.

He narrowed his eyes, and that was when she remembered he had trouble seeing things from far away.

She remembered then, too, that they'd also gotten the hawkeye binoculars from Malo Mart. Reaching into her pouch, she grabbed it and pulled it out for Link. He raised an eyebrow, but accepted it from her regardless.

"...Oh," he said as he held it up to his face. "I see 'em now. More than just that one on the balcony... Here." He pulled the hawkeye back and held it over to her. "Why don't you use it to shoot them down before they spot us?"

That definitely sounded like a better idea than rushing in and having twenty of them descend on them at once. Nodding, she took the hawkeye from Link, fitted it onto her face, and got her bow and arrows ready. Through the lenses, the village leapt into sharp, up-close focus. The lone Bulblin on the balcony, the one she'd been able to see with her naked eyes, was again the first one that she noticed. With the extra help of the device, she could make out others—some standing around talking to one another, some leaning lazily against the crumbling buildings. None seemed to have noticed them yet.

She nocked an arrow and drew the bowstring back, steadying her breath. With her not being accustomed to shooting with her sight zoomed in so much, her first shot was a miss, and so was her second one. The third one struck true, piercing the Bulblin on the balcony. It slumped over the wooden railing, then tumbled over, and disappeared in a puff as its body hit the earth below. She moved on to the next target—a Bulblin standing just beyond a broken window. Two shots, and she got it. Her aim continued to improve as she worked through the visible Bulblins systematically.

"...Got 'em," she said after she'd taken down every last one she could see from their current vantage point. She slung the bow over her shoulder and took the hawkeye off. "The rest must be inside or hiding between the buildings."

"Let's move in," Link said, unsheathing his sword. "There shouldn't be many more left."

She nodded, and together they advanced into the heart of the tiny village.

The rest of their battle was swift and efficient. Aside from a single arrow grazing Link's already-damaged tunic, its impact deflected by his chainmail, they dispatched the remaining Bulblins without trouble. Link even had the time to stop and howl at a howling stone hidden behind one of the buildings. By the time the last monster fell—there really were exactly twenty of them, as Darbus had somehow smelled—they were up by a house situated at the very end of the village. A faint click coming from its doorknob got them both to look over at it.

A tiny, frail, elderly woman emerged, her hands trembling on the edge of the door as she stepped out cautiously. Her narrow eyes darted between them, filled with a mix of hope and wariness.

"The beasts... Their howls have faded into silence," she rasped. "Did you two...?"

Link nodded, finally sheathing his sword.

The old woman gasped and took a stumbling step toward him. "It's... It's you, the savior! Your name... It's Link, isn't it?" Again, Link nodded. She clasped her hands together and smiled up at him. "Ah! I knew it... And you—you are...?"

"Vanna," she said. "Who are you?"

"Oh, I haven't introduced myself...! I am Impaz. My name comes from the great one who built this village so long ago... In a time before it was infested with dangerous beasts. It was once the secret home of a proud tribe who served the Royal Family."

Vanna glanced back at the desolate village. "Why are you here all alone?"

"By royal order, I can't leave this place until a certain person arrives—no matter what terrible fate is beset upon it," Impaz said. She looked up at Link with a little smile. "So, then, Link... I take it you saved that nice girl?"

"Yes. Ilia's safe," Link said.

"How lovely," Impaz sighed out. "When she was here, she would often cheer me up by saying that you would come to help. Such a sweet girl. She was worrying about me even as I was helping her to escape from here... Oh, but listen to me blathering on! I have a favor to ask of you—would you help me return something to her? It's a charm of hers..."

Link agreed to return the charm to Ilia, and Impaz then invited them inside her shack to retrieve it. Sitting on an old wooden table was the charm—a necklace with beads and a flute-type instrument curved like a horseshoe.

It was hard to believe that something as simple as that would be the thing to finally bring back her memories.

"I think she always kept it close to her heart, but she had to part with it when she was trying to protect me..." Impaz said as she grabbed it and held it out to him. "I believe in my heart that it's kept me safe all this time. So, please... I ask that you return it to her. And please tell her this old biddy was very grateful."

"We will," Link said with a solemn nod, slipping the charm into his pouch.

"But before we go," Vanna said, "Ilia told us that you were talking to her about a rod of the heavens...?"

Impaz's eyes lit up. "Indeed. That is why I must stay in this village—I must deliver a message to the bearer of the rod of the heavens."

Slowly, Vanna reached behind her and pulled out the Dominion Rod from her pouch. If Impaz's eyes had lit up just before, they were now positively ablaze.

"That rod...!" she said. "Is that the Dominion Rod? Oh—could you really be the messenger to the heavens?!"

"Um... I think he is, technically, probably," she said, nodding her head at Link and stashing the rod away. As much as she'd taken to using the Dominion Rod, she definitely wasn't part of some Hyrulean prophecy to be a messenger to the heavens.

"Have you used the rod before?" Impaz asked, looking back and forth at both of them.

"I have," Vanna said at the same time as Link said, "I haven't."

"Then it must be you, dear," Impaz said to her, smiling.

"But I just—"

"There is no need to fight it," Impaz said. "Among the legends of my clan, there is a story from the time when the Oocca still maintained contact with the Royal Family... It said that the Dominion Rod was handed down from the people of the sky to their messenger, only to be carried when the Royal Family needed to communicate with the Oocca."

And here Vanna'd been practically playing with the thing.

...She guessed, though, with how much closer she'd gotten to the Oocca than Link, it probably did make sense for her rather than him to have an item of theirs.

"That very legend is the reason why I was ordered to stay in this village," Impaz went on. "Over generations, my ancestors have guarded the book that, by royal decree, was to be given to the messenger of the heavens."

Impaz turned around and slowly hobbled her way over to a dusty bookshelf, and pulled out a dark, worn book.

"Here—take it," Impaz said, holding the book up to Vanna like it was something sacred.

Vanna felt like a fraud taking it from her, but she did. Unclasping it and opening it, she saw that it was filled with what she could only describe as runes. "What ... is this?"

"It is written in the ancient language of Sky Writing," Impaz said.

"And... Somehow, it'll help bring power back to the Dominion Rod?"

"If you can find someone to read the ancient language, then yes, all power should be restored to the rod."

"...We should ask Shad," Link said, looking at the book.

"Good timing for him to be in Kakariko," Vanna said, carefully closing and reclasping it. "We'll ask him when we get back."

As Vanna put the book into her pouch, Impaz sighed with a smile still on her face. "Ah, I am so glad I stayed in this village and got to meet that girl. Meeting her must've been ordained by the Gods, so that I could be here today to pass on this knowledge..."

"Must've been," Vanna quietly agreed.

"So—go on, now," Impaz said, her voice soft but resolute. "Be the messenger to the heavens that my people have spoken of for generations!"

Chapter Text

By the time they made it back to Kakariko Village on Shad's horse, the sun was beginning to set, and the smell of dinner was wafting out from the Elde Inn to the street.

Everyone was gathered around the tables eating when they entered, and two extra plates were sat out alongside the kids. They excitedly beckoned them over to join them. As they did, Vanna's eyes were caught on the sight of Ilia and Shad sitting together at the next table over, talking easily. It was strange, seeing those two—the Maddie-doppelganger and the Bax-doppelganger—sitting right next to each other. Back in her original world, Vanna rarely ever saw Bax without also seeing Maddie and vice versa, but the versions of them here had been totally separate from one another up until now. She wondered if this was the start of their friendship blooming anew in this universe.

Now, they just needed a Nessa from this world, and a Zi and a Vanna, and their friend group would be complete.

After they'd all finished dinner, she got out the ancient book Impaz had given to her and went to sit down next to Shad. His eyes lit up the second they laid on the worn cover of the book. She wondered if he was merely entranced by its clear ancientness or if there was some detail in its markings that he recognized.

"Shad," she began, holding the book slightly out toward him. "Do you think you can read this?"

"I can certainly try." He adjusted his glasses, eyes gleaming with curiosity, and accepted the book from her. As soon as he opened it up to his first page, his breath was taken away. "This...! This is Sky Writing! Where in blazes did you find this?!"

"An old lady gave it to me," she answered casually. "Apparently, it's supposed to have some spell in it that can restore magic to this 'rod of the heavens' thing I have...?"

Shad carefully combed through it. "The information this book contains is ... dense, from a cursory glance. I imagine it might take me some time to find something so specific in its pages. Would it be all right for me to keep it for a while?"

Vanna agreed, and Shad excused himself from the table to go find a quieter place to sit down and read through the book. That left her and Ilia alone at the table together.

"...So," Vanna started. "Link and I found something for you."

"Oh?" Ilia said with a tilt of her head. Link turned his own head to look at Vanna from where he still sat at the table with the children, raising an eyebrow at her as if to ask if she was really doing this now.

"It'd probably be for the best if we gave it to you privately," she amended. "Actually... Link might want to give it to you without me there, either."

"I don't mind either way—it's up to her," Link said, standing up and walking over to them. "I just thought she might not wanna have everybody around when ... y'know."

"Um... I guess I'll go with you alone," Ilia said to Link.

Vanna saw that coming.

"Upstairs...?" Link said.

Ilia agreed and stood up, and Link motioned for her to follow him. As Vanna watched the two ascend the staircase together, she felt strangely anxious that the game was wrong, that the charm wouldn't make Ilia's memories return.

Vanna stayed behind with the children at first, listening to their chatter about things that had been going on recently—which wasn't very much, but they certainly made it out to be. For the most part, she was trying her hardest to be nosy and listen out for Ilia and Link's discussion upstairs, but she couldn't make out anything.

Then Zi came in through the front doors, and from the look on his face, she knew it wasn't good news.

"Your place," was all he said.

Wordlessly, she got up and followed him out of the inn, wondering all the while what Fanadi could have said to elicit this type of reaction from him. She had to run to keep up with his impatient strides as he led them toward her shack.

Zi didn't stop walking when he entered—even as she shut the door behind her, he continued pacing in what small room he had.

"He's not dead," he said, voice tight, "and he's not hiding, either. Not intentionally. But he's not out looking for you—hasn't been out looking for you. He's changed. For the fucking worst. I didn't think it was even possible. I didn't think he'd go this far."

"Zi," she said, reaching out to grab him as he paced next to her. "What did the fortune teller say?"

He stopped finally, taking in a deep breath to ground himself. "My dad came into contact with a dark force that promised him the power to find and subdue you, and he was taken into a realm of shadows to wait for your arrival, and he was given an artifact that turned him into a monster. Literally, he's a fucking monster now."

She staggered back a step into the closed door, her mouth opening and closing as she tried to form a coherent thought. Her mind raced, flashing through memories of Mr. Rider—and then trying to imagine him transformed into a genuine monstrosity.

Before she could come up with any way to respond, Midna emerged from Vanna's shadow, her tiny fists clenched tight. "Zant gave him a piece of the Fused Shadows?!"

"That's what it sounds like," Zi said. "The fortune teller didn't name Zant or the Fused Shadows directly, but the descriptions matched."

"What ... fools! Both of them!" Midna put her hands on her hips. "I thought your dad was supposed to be smart!"

"She said he was 'taken by the prospect of power,'" Zi said with air quotes and an unfavorable voice. "I don't think he realized that power would take away his humanity."

Just then, something truly hit Vanna. "You're saying he's... Mr. Rider's not even human anymore?"

Zi looked at her like she was an idiot. "What'd you think I meant when I said he was a literal monster?"

"I got that, it's just..." She had to take a moment to find the right way to frame her realization. "It didn't really register with me before—that he thought that me not being human was enough justification to kill me, but now he's not a human, either."

"Gives us all the more justification to kill him," Midna said.

"Yeah..." Zi agreed morosely. "If we didn't have to before, we really have to kill him now."

Vanna tensed. "We didn't have to kill Darbus when the Fused Shadow made him a monster..."

"So we beat the Fused Shadow out of Rider, then kill him if he survives it like Darbus did," Midna said with a shrug. She suddenly narrowed her eyes at Vanna, then rolled both them and her head back with a groan. "Ugh. Don't tell me you're getting all wishy-washy about taking down someone who's out to kill you. Again."

"I know he needs to be taken down. It's just..." She trailed off, trying to find some way to put her hesitance into words. "...You know I've had other ideas on how to stop him besides killing him, and I just ... wanna make sure we're making the best choice. What if we can find my Hyrulean counterpart and use her to make him think I've become human after all? What if I can wish on the Triforce to actually become human?"

Midna groaned again, louder this time. "We can't keep banking on potential solutions, Vanna."

"I'm not saying we need to bank on them," Vanna said. "Just ... keep them in mind."

Midna crossed her arms. "We can keep them in mind, sure. But we can't let them slow us down just because you feel bad about killing a monster that's been out to kill you."

"Oh," Zi suddenly said—and from the way he said it and his distant stare, Vanna knew it wasn't in response to their conversation, but rather something that he'd been going over in his head. He blinked and snuck a glance at her before looking at Midna. "Don't get on her about being wishy-washy on this... She probably literally can't help it. One of the main rules for robots is to not harm or kill humans."

"Good thing Rider's not human anymore then, right?" Midna said.

"But that's still probably where that hesitance comes from," Zi said. He looked at Vanna, then. "...Right?"

Vanna thought about it. Maybe it was partially true, but she knew it wasn't fully true, because she could pinpoint an exact moment that contributed to her hesitance—when she was on the table about to be killed, and Mr. Rider admitted to her that he didn't like that he was going to kill her, but felt that he had to because of all the warnings he'd heard about robots like her.

Instead of responding, she just shrugged and looked away.

"So, once we get the last mirror shard, we'll go into the Twilight Realm and defeat him and Zant," Midna said. "...And if we happen to run into a Vanna-lookalike along the way, then we can think about not killing him for good."

Zi agreed, and with a sigh, Vanna did, too.

"Speaking of the lookalike thing..." Zi started. "Before I went to the fortune teller, I spent a long time in Castle Town looking for Vanna's counterpart..."

Vanna's eyes widened. "Did you find her?"

"No," he said, lips offset in a frown. "...But I found your dad's counterpart."

She froze, her breath catching in her throat. "My dad's counterpart? He's alive here?"

Zi nodded, his expression unreadable. "He runs a dairy farm near the edge of Castle Town. Looks just like your dad—but, y'know, with pointy ears. And he has an English accent. It's really weird."

A mix of emotions swirled in her chest, with hope being at the forefront. "Did you talk to him?"

"Yeah," Zi said slowly. "Turns out he has a daughter named Maven—who it's pretty safe to assume looks just like a Hylian version of you."

"Why didn't you bring this up earlier?!" Vanna said, nearly bouncing with excitement.

"Because she's not here," he said, his voice dropping. "She left the country a few months back, and her dad hasn't been able to contact her since."

Her hope withered in an instant. "Oh..."

"Yeah," he said through a grimace. "We don't really have time to go searching the whole world in hopes of finding her. So..."

"So that plan is gone," Vanna said, unable to keep the tone of defeat out of her voice as disappointment settled heavily in her chest.

Zi nodded, watching her carefully as if bracing for an argument or a breakdown.

For a moment, Vanna wanted to push back, to cling to the sliver of possibility that they could find Maven. Without Maven, her only plan left was to use the Triforce to wish to become human herself, and that plan was steeped in even more uncertainty than her counterpart plan had been... But if even her own father hadn't been able to contact her for months, how could some strangers possibly find her in what little time they had left?

Vanna sighed again, her shoulders slumping. "Well... Thanks for trying, Zi. I appreciate it."

Zi hesitated for a moment before placing a hand on her shoulder, his grip solid and grounding. "It'll be okay, Vanna. With or without her."

Though she knew he meant for his words to be reassuring, they only made her realize how much she'd been counting on her counterpart to be the missing piece to fix everything. "Yeah..." she agreed halfheartedly.

The room fell into silence, and as Zi's hand slipped off her shoulder, Midna slunk her way back into her shadow with a sigh.

"...Did Ilia get her memory back?" Zi finally said.

"Link just went upstairs with her to give her the charm when you came in, so I don't know if it worked or not," she said. "Wanna go back to the inn and see?"

Zi agreed, and the two of them left her shack side by side. Vanna thought of Maven more as they walked. How long would it take to find Maven, really? How much did Maven actually look like a Hylian version of her? What if the reason why Maven's dad couldn't contact her was that she'd actually died, and all this time Vanna had truly been chasing a completely hopeless dream?

Even before they made it inside the inn, they knew that it had worked by the sound of mirth coming from through the doors. They paused just beyond them, closing the doors behind them softly.

Inside, Ilia was standing near the bottom of the steps, her face streaked with tears but lit up by a radiant smile. Everyone was gathered around her with all their eyes glued on her.

"I can't believe I forgot all of you," Ilia was saying, her voice thick with emotion.

"It's okay!" Beth said, throwing herself at her for a hug.

"Yeah!" Talo agreed. "What matters is that you're back to normal now."

Ilia gave a small nod, and then her shining green eyes rose from the height of the kids and fell right on Vanna. The smile that had been on her face faltered. Ilia's eyes lingered on her for a beat too long before flitting over to Link. Vanna couldn't stop herself from looking at him, too, and she caught him looking at her for a split second before he returned his gaze to Ilia. Though Vanna's eyes were fixed on Link, she could still see the way Ilia pursed her lips at that. Link mirrored her expression.

Sighing, Ilia looked back over to her, and then she put on a smile. "My memories came back."

"I'm glad," Vanna said, returning her smile in spite of the lingering tension.

Slowly but surely, everyone dispersed, settling around the lobby instead of staying gathered right around Ilia. Ilia herself stayed up, going around to everyone to speak to them for a bit.

Vanna couldn't help but notice the look she gave her when Link sat down next to her.

Eventually, the front doors opened up to reveal Shad, the ancient book in his hands and a broad smile on his face. He nearly tripped over his own feet coming over to sit at the table that Vanna was at with Link and Zi.

"I believe I've found it!" he said, flipping the book open and sliding it over to her. "A passage on restoring magic to the rod of the heavens."

"That was quicker than I thought it'd be," Vanna said as her eyes pored over the page. She had no idea how Shad had managed to read any of it. The language looked like chicken scratch to her.

"I might've forgotten to mention that I am quite the fast reader. A-anyhow, it's right here..." Shad readjusted his glasses before mumbling out something equally as indecipherable as the written sky language.

As Shad's voice rolled through the strange syllables, the air in the room seemed to shift—and then she felt it. A faint vibration against her side.

Her hand flew to her pouch instinctively where the Dominion Rod was safely tucked away. With the final syllable of the spell, a pulse of warm energy radiated through her pouch. She reached into it and pulled out the Dominion Rod, finding it restored and glowing anew.

"It worked," she said, her eyes wide as she turned the rod over in her hands.

"Brilliant!" Shad exclaimed, clapping his hands together with a delighted grin.

Before anyone else in the room could notice—she didn't want to take anything away from what very much still felt like Ilia's moment—she stuffed it back into her pouch. "Thank you, Shad."

"It was my pleasure," he said. "If I may be so bold... Could I perchance ask to keep this book? I-if not, that's quite all right, but—"

"Go ahead," she said. "If I end up needing something from it, I'd have to bring it back to you anyway. It's not like I can read it."

Shad's face lit up, and he stammered with excitement over his thanks.

"Well," Zi started, standing up from the table and looking down at her. "Now that that's all taken care of, wanna come with me to the sanctuary? I wanna see what's there."

Vanna agreed and stood up with him, and to her surprise, Link stood up as well. "You're coming with us?" she asked him. "I thought you might wanna stay here for a bit longer with everyone."

He glanced from Zi to her, and though he didn't say anything, she knew what he was thinking—he still didn't fully trust Zi to be alone with her.

"I'll be fine," she said.

"Maybe," Link said with a shrug. "But ... this all has to do with what we're doin', right? So I should be there."

She didn't push back anymore at that. As the three of them made their way to the front doors together, she couldn't stop herself from stealing another glance at Ilia, and she was frowning at the sight of them leaving.

Stepping out into the chilled evening air, they headed down the length of the village to the sanctuary. Along the way, Zi told them about how everything happened in the game—apparently, Link was supposed to go all over Hyrule with the restored Dominion Rod, tracking down statues and moving them to reveal letters missing from the ancient book, and once that was all done, Mr. Bax-lookalike would speak out the finished spell which would remove a seal on a statue in the cellar, allowing Link to move it with the Dominion Rod and reveal a hidden room with a giant broken cannon, which he'd then have to take down to Lake Hylia to have a guy fix, and finally, he'd be shot up to the City in the Sky where the final mirror shard was...

"Jesus," she said.

"Yeah," Zi said. "We should probably be thanking him we don't have to do all that shit in real life."

They made it into the sanctuary then, and one by one began to descend the ladder into the cellar. When she was about halfway down, she felt her pouch start to vibrate again. The vibrations got stronger and stronger as she descended. Jumping off the bottom rung, she reached into her pouch to pull out the Dominion Rod.

The cellar slowly began to fill with light, though not just from the glowing sphere atop the Dominion Rod—lines along the surface of the giant bell tucked away in the cellar glowed, faintly at first, then brighter, until they were the same ethereal green as the light of the rod.

A low, resonant sound came from the bell. Slowly, it started to rise, revealing a base beneath it just like the ones she'd had to walk Buddy onto, but there was something else in the spot where he'd gone in the bells in the temple. A circular podium was in the center, engraved with intricate, glowing patterns.

"...What's that for?" Zi asked.

Vanna stepped up closer to the bell, not quite getting underneath it, for a closer look at the podium. At its center was a cavity, its shape immediately recognizable to her—the bottom of the Dominion Rod would fit into it perfectly.

She would've told Zi and Link this revelation right away, but instead, she was distracted by the sudden sound of frantic clucking getting closer and closer. The sound of wings flapping joined in, and all of them looked back at the cellar's entryway just in time to see Ooccoo plop unceremoniously to the ground, her little head of a son casually floating down behind her.

"Wait! Don't go yet!" Ooccoo called, shaking out her feathers before racing over to the bell. "This is it! Our way home!"

"This takes you to the City in the Sky?" Zi asked. "This bell? Not, like, a cannon or something?"

"It's not just any bell—it's a warping bell!" Ooccoo said. "It was created to allow the messenger of the heavens to go back and forth between the lands below and above."

"...You can warp, though," Zi said. The follow-up question was as obvious as it was unspoken.

"Not there," Ooccoo said. "Our home is cloaked with magic. My people are usually able to breach the cloak ourselves, but I unfortunately never learned how... And then my son fell to the surface. That left this bell as the only way for us to return." She waddled up to Vanna. "If you insert the rod into the pedestal, the bell will warp everyone standing under the bell up to the city above. Were you intending to go now?"

"It's kinda late to start a new temple," Zi said before Vanna could respond to her. "Especially this one. If it's dark out, you're gonna risk accidentally walking off a sky island and falling to your death."

Vanna hesitated, glancing between the Dominion Rod in her hands and the glowing podium beneath the raised bell. Zi had a point—and even if Link probably wouldn't struggle to see in the dark, it still felt safer to go up during daylight hours. "Yeah," she agreed. "We're not going right now. We were mostly just coming here to see how this whole thing was gonna work out."

"Good," Ooccoo breathed. "Much as I want to get home, I'd like to wait until it's bright out again. Us Oocca have poor night vision, especially in our youth. That was why Junior fell off an island in the first place!"

"Is it easy to fall off?" Link asked.

"In some places, very much so! Being up in the sky, there are lots of sudden and strong wind gusts, and if you happen to be standing, say, on a bridge with no side-railing..." Ooccoo shuddered. "It would not end well for you non-winged individuals."

Link frowned and looked at Vanna. "You're gonna have to be really, really careful if you come along. I don't want the wind knocking you off."

"I don't want the wind knocking you off, either, when you're the one that's gonna go splat if you fall off," Vanna said. "We both better be careful."

"I'm a lot heavier than you, though," Link said. "All it would take is one gust to knock you over."

"For real," Zi chirped in. "And you might not go splat if you fall, but you'll be damaged beyond repair, too. But, honestly, Link... I think you're gonna end up needing to go most of this one alone, anyway. Unless you want Vanna to be hanging on your back while you clawshot around a lot."

"We've done that before, but..." Some sort of understanding dawned on Link. "...But you're scared of heights, and we'd be all the way up in the sky doing that..."

Somehow, Vanna hadn't even considered the heights situation until just now.

"Oh," she said quietly.

Zi raised an eyebrow at her. "Since when are you scared of heights? You get on the tallest roller coasters with me every time we go to an amusement park."

"That's different," she said. "I know I'm not gonna fall on roller coasters, and also roller coasters aren't located over top of abysses."

"You know," Ooccoo said, "you don't have to stay in the city. You can warp me and Junior up and then come right back down here."

"But I do have to stay in the city," Vanna said. "We're looking for something that's up there."

"I'm sure I can find it on my own, Vanna," Link said.

"I don't want you to have to go alone just 'cause I'm scared," she said, standing up straighter and tightening her jaw. "I can push through it."

"It wouldn't be 'just 'cause you're scared'—it'd be 'cause that's what's safest for you."

"There's a shop just near the warping bell in the city," Ooccoo said. "If you're scared of heights, perhaps you can just go in there while Link searches the city."

Link nodded at her words, giving her a look that asked if she would agree.

She didn't want to acquiesce. She didn't want to give in to her cowardly side. Even if she viewed it from the other perspective—that she would only be doing what was safest for her—she still didn't want to cave in, because Link wouldn't be safe, either, taking on whatever dangers would be in the temple alone.

But the thought of clinging to Link's back while he swooped around on the chain of the clawshot, potentially thousands of feet up in the air...

Vanna swallowed hard and avoided Link's gaze. "...We'll see when we get there."

The tension lingered for a moment before Link relented with a small nod. Ooccoo, seemingly satisfied, gave a little flap of her wings.

"Well, if there's nothing else to discuss, Junior and I will be preparing ourselves for tomorrow's journey," she said. "We'll meet you here in the morning!"

Ooccoo and Junior began to warp away, then. Once the babbling noises of their warping process had all faded away, the cellar was left feeling strangely quiet. Slowly, Vanna moved to put the Dominion Rod back into her pouch, and the glow of the bell dimmed as soon as she let its miniaturized form drop.

"...So," Zi started. "You weren't there earlier when I told Vanna, Link, but ... I found out something about my dad."

Link asked what he'd found out, and Zi went over what all he'd told her—that his dad had been transformed into a literal monster, presumably by way of Zant giving him a piece of the Fused Shadow. Vanna still had trouble picturing it in her head, but Link didn't look surprised at all, just angered that Mr. Rider had gone so far. Zi also told him about Maven, and again, Link didn't seem surprised to find out that she was currently unreachable.

Once he was all caught up, the three of them began to make their way out of the cellar. The sun was completely set by the time they made it back outside, leaving the air even more chilled than it had been before.

Vanna's mind stayed caught on Maven, considering her in ways she hadn't earlier. What kind of life did Maven live here, in this world so different from her original one? What other ways did Maven's life overlap with hers aside from having a dad who looked just like hers? Why had Maven left the country a few months ago? Was Maven looking for an answer to her life's problems, just the same way she'd been months back when she'd stolen NEVA? Vanna knew Maven wouldn't be searching for her dad like she'd been, since hers was alive and well in Castle Town, so what exactly was it that drew her away from home? What more could Maven want out of life?

How would Maven feel to know, that even though Vanna knew little more than her name, that she—herself, just from a different universe—was horridly envious of her for getting to be born a Hylian in this world?