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Link is running.
The night is dark, and this is the deepest part of it. The only light is coming from the thin sliver of the moon high above. And Link is running.
He’s not running from something, which is nice, although there have been plenty of times these past few weeks (months) that he’s had to strategically retreat from creatures that would have overwhelmed him otherwise. He’s been keeping a list in the back of his head, one that he hopes to return to when he has time and he’s a little better equipped, once he’s—
After.
If there is an after.
He shoves that thought down, as he has many times, into the same place where he keeps all his questions about before. He still doesn’t remember much from before he woke up, even now that he’s gone to all the places in the album Zelda left for him and recalled the memories those locations triggered. Certainly nothing from before they realized the Calamity was coming back. He doesn’t remember finding the Master Sword for the first time, or learning to fight with it, or meeting Zelda for the first time.
He doesn’t remember his parents.
He pushes that thought down with the others—he will remember one day; if he got back what he already has, he can get the rest too—and keeps running.
Ahead of him, a streak of golden light is stretching up toward the sky, the last residue of the fallen star reaching back to where it came from. He can just see the point that the stardust is rising from, on a grassy slope across the broad valley from where he is now. He should be able to get there by sunrise, he thinks, as long as he doesn’t run into any delays.
Of course, this is a delay in and of itself. He knows that—knows that he should be fighting Ganon right now, or at least on his way to do so. He’s still aching a little from the battle with the Windblight, but all things considered, it wasn’t that bad. Mipha should be ready to heal him again by the time he gets to Hyrule Castle.
He has to admit there’s something strange about Mipha popping up every time he should go down in a fight, whenever he hits the ground a little too hard. He’s realized at some point that she doesn’t just heal him—she brings him back. It was my pleasure, she always says, though he wonders about that. Wonders if it’s truly worth it.
Especially when the best descriptor for how he would have died is ‘decided to harass a Lynel.’ Especially when, if she hadn’t, he would have fallen doing something other than his duty.
But he needs that little piece of star. It’s hidden behind a low hill now, but he can still see the trail of golden light marking it. He needs it for the Great Fairy above Kakariko Village to do whatever it is she does to make his armor just that little bit stronger before he faces down Ganon. Even with the powers the Champions have given him, he’ll need every last bit of protection he can get if he’s going to survive long enough to emerge victorious. And he knows that, even if he is victorious, even if they win, he might not survive. He’s always known that.
When it comes right down to it, he’s scared.
Of course he’s scared—he’s fighting against a threat that’s been trying to destroy Hyrule for ten thousand years. He’s not even sure how old he is, doesn’t remember. Certainly not old enough to drink—or, at least, that Gerudo woman had been certain of that. Zelda’s seventeen, or was a hundred years ago, and he thinks he probably has to be around the same age. He is going to go, of course, fear or no fear. He may not remember his father, but some small part of him feels like he remembers a voice so much like his own, just older and deeper, telling him that fear is nothing to be ashamed of, that fear is just the first step of courage.
He is going to face the Calamity, and hopefully defeat it, as soon as he can.
He just has to hope Zelda can hold out until he gets there.
All right, honey, just let me get the bird and then I’ll be right there, he remembers thinking, hearing Zelda’s voice in his head. He’d just seen the last memory, the one Impa sent him after, the one where he fell and Zelda saved him, and he was blinking in the afterimage. And then he got the bird and turned toward the castle, where a great red X was converging, beams coming from every corner of Hyrule. Then, somewhere above him, a golden light flashed across the sky almost like a stone skipping on a pond, and somewhere off to the southwest, a star fell.
Almost before he knew it, without consciously thinking about it, he was jumping off Vah Medoh’s perch, snapping the paraglider out above himself.
He’s cresting the top of the hill now, and he can see the place where the star fell once more. But the world is already starting to lighten around him; he’s going to be cutting it close. He hesitates for a moment as he runs past a Bokoblin camp—but there’s not a village or even a stable anywhere nearby, not even a road for unsuspecting travelers to get ambushed on. The Bokoblins aren’t hurting anyone out here. Besides, that one lying closest to the fire is silver, and Link can’t spare the time it’ll take to beat it. He adds the camp to the list in his head, though.
As he runs past, one of them—not the silver one—hears him and leaps to its feet with a muffled, snorting squawk. Link just ducks his head and runs faster, though, and by the time he has to slow down to catch his breath, the Bokoblin has either given up or just forgotten about him.
He doesn’t much care which.
He’s not sure when he started calling Zelda ‘honey’ in his head. Probably somewhere between watching her father tear into her for being too curious about the Guardians and, in a later memory, watching himself hold her, watching her fall into despair as those same Guardians turned against them and their friends fell, one by one, to the Blights within their Divine Beasts. It started as an ‘oh, honey,’ something to contain the sympathy he felt for her despite how frustrated she’d been with herself. Now it’s become something else, though, something more familiar and less pitying. Which is for the best—she definitely doesn’t want his pity. He likes the softness of it, the way it could be something any boy would call the girl he’d taken a shine to. He knows it doesn’t show anywhere near the proper degree of deference, and of course, he’ll never call her that to her face, but for now—for now it’s nice.
Link has learned that he has to take peace where and when he can find it, to accept whatever little bits of joy and solace come his way. Whether that’s Sidon, or five little Rito girls singing together, or laughing at himself for calling the ruler of his kingdom honey. Or moments of relative quiet like this, chasing fallen stars. Even after the Calamity, there’s just so much joy in Hyrule. It all comes from the people, he knows—everyone he’s met on his travels, all of them just trying to live happy, peaceful lives despite the shadow looming over them. Every single one of them deserves and is worthy of being protected, and, more to the point, needs to be protected.
He just hopes Zelda can meet them all one day. That Hyrule will still be there, and that the last hundred years of fighting won't have been in vain.
Link can hear the star now as he approaches, a high-pitched ringing sound that builds as he gets closer. Then, when he’s just a few steps away, the sound drops to nothing. The trail of stardust vanishes, and the burning fades. The star fragment glows gently, soft and yellow against the green of the grass.
He’s found a few of these by now; no matter how many times it happens, whenever he sees that golden streak in the sky, he can never quite resist the urge to drop whatever it is he’s doing and follow. But he’s surprised, as he always is, at how small this tiny bit of star is, to have come so far.
The sun breaches the horizon as Link is bending down to pick up the star fragment. A moment later, he’s tucking it safely away. He turns toward Hyrule Castle. He can’t see it, not from here—this is one of the few spots in Hyrule where that’s true—but he can still tell where it is, as though some force is drawing him toward it. He’s not sure which of them is doing it, but whichever one it is, they’ll get their wish soon enough.
He just has a little more to do to prepare. Then he’ll be ready.
Link will fight as many enemies and fall as many times as he has to. For Hyrule. For Zelda.
Zelda, who has his heart and has for as long as he can remember, who gives him courage, who he knows would do—has done—is doing the same for him. She has been strong, and steadfast, and braver than anyone had any right to ask her to be. And now it’s Link’s turn.
All right, honey, I’ll be right there.
Link starts running.