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The Flow of Time	By : Catbeastaisha Category: Zelda > General Views: 5083 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own The Legend of Zelda game series, nor any of the characters from them. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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Chapter Four: A Hero’s Quest
Disclaimer: Zelda characters and Hyrule are owned by Nintendo. Badria and Kaula, however, are mine.

           I was never meant to survive.

            The fortuneteller spoke the words without hesitation or remorse, said them so casually we might have been talking of the squashing of a flower or the death of a bee. I was not meant to live.

            When Zelda had played the Ocarina to send me back to my time and I’d returned the Master Sword to its pedestal, she’d failed to mention that I would be the only one to remember. It must have slipped her mind, such a trivial matter as that. You see, time had picked up exactly where it left off, save for one important detail… There was no Ganondorf. Without him, there was no darkness spreading across the land, no cries of pain and destruction. Without the land crying in desperation, there was no call for the Sages to be awakened. Without need for the Sages…

           There was no need for me.

           They’d abandoned me. Left me to play make-believe with their lives while I struggled with the reality they’d forsaken and forced on me to bear. What should I do with the knowledge of the world we prevented? Of the people we were, of the people we could be?

           Could I still be the man I was?

           The fortuneteller made a small bubbling sound in the back of her throat, her lazy eye gazing above me while her head tilted drunkenly, her glass eye keeping me pegged with its non-existent gaze. When her mouth opened her breath wheezed out, the words rusted and creaking,

           “If that is all you wanted to know…”

           “There’s more!” I was hasty to interject least the witch think I’d let her keep all one hundred rupees after just answering one question. Her mouth slowly closed, setting into a tiny, withered smile as though she’d know that all along and was merely prodding.

           “Why?”

           “Why…what?” The left side of her smile tucked up even higher. Not for the first time did I wish that I had my other, older form. It was hard to loom down over someone when you looked as imposing as a toddler.

           “Why was I supposed to die?”

           Her fingers, literally skin on bones, reached a hand outward to pluck a thick cigar from a jeweled case by her folded, weathered legs. She held it out towards me, expectantly. Crossing my eyes and biting my tongue, I snatched it out of her grasp and lit the cigar from a torch embedded in the stone, nearly tossing it back at her. The old ghoul gave a pleased grin before taking a deep suck on the end, the embers glowing as she inhaled.

           “Well?”

           Pulling the cigar away, she leveled it so the red embers were before her lips and blew. The smoke billowed out, twisting and twining through the air. Her lazy eye zoned in on it, watched it trail and dissipate before bobbing back to stare at the ceiling.

           “To ensure heroes for the future.” She shifted, her old bones creaking and popping as she lifted a curled finger to gesture in my direction. “Had you sealed him at the exact moment he slew you, there would be no loose ends.” She put the cigar back into her mouth. “Your piece of the Triforce would have gone dormant until need for a new hero would have summoned it forth.”

           “So why wasn’t I?”

           “Killed?” The fortuneteller grinded on the end of the cigar, pulling in a deep breath before exhaling smoke through her nostrils. “Something remains undone.”

           “Undone?! I rode my horse, fought the monster, and rescued the fucking princess!” My voice rose at the last part. “In what way have I left anything undone?!”

           “Unless you have another hundred rupees,” the ancient crone’s voice cracked, “I have no reason to answer that.”

           I frantically dug out my money pouch, retrieving what little money I had left. A measly thirty-two rupees… she seized it with a speed that would have made Epona jealous.

           “Not enough,” she mumbled, eye rolling around in her head while the glass one still stared straight ahead. “Not enough for your question…” She tilted her head suddenly, body going still. Even her eye froze in place. When she relaxed again, she took the cigar from her lips and shook loose the ashes. “Not enough for your question,” she repeated, “but enough I’ll give you this...”

           The torches nearby flickered violently as the woman’s hand snaked out and grabbed my wrist before I could even guess her intention. I tried shaking it off but she had a tight grip I couldn’t break. Hair flowing free, she rose to her feet, surprisingly steady, her eyes locking with mine. I expected her voice to boom out but instead it was spoken softly, almost hypnotically as she grinned.

           “There is one creature who remembers.”

           A gust of wind blew through, the torches nearly going out, throwing the cave into near darkness. I felt her hand slide from mine, heard a faint rustling sound, then silence. When the flames recovered enough, they once again illuminated the fact that I was alone.

           The witch was gone.

           I felt my legs grow unsteady and sat with a thud on the ground, hands shaking as I raised them to hold my face. She was lying. Saria. Nabooru. Ruto. Darunia. Impa. Even Zelda. None of them remembered. They thought I’d been crazy when I made mention of such a time period. Anything preceding the drawing of the Master Sword they could recall but whatever lay after was a complete blank to them. Their future selves had made sure to erase me from their thoughts, easier that way. Easier to forget what they put me through.

           Do they think they can erase what they’ve done to me so easily? All the crap I went through for them? Did they really think by putting me back into a child’s body I would just forgive and forget?

           Then again, if what the fortuneteller said is true, I was never meant to survive. Did they know that? Were they as surprised as I am now, to learn I should have died? Was my will that much greater than destiny’s? Somehow a tad stronger than fate’s? Or is it that the Goddesses still have some wonderful, terrible plan for me? Some reason to keep me alive for…

           For what? How long does a dead man have to live? If I was already intended to die did that give me a day? A few months? A year? If there was something the Goddesses had left for me to achieve for them, once I completed it would I fall to the ground, dead? If my whole purpose in life had been to fight Ganondorf then why was I still here?

           Could it be that there is something left for me to do, greater than Ganondorf?!

           When will it end?

           If I believe that I was truly meant to die that day, I should reconsider her words. But really… who would remember if not the caster of the spell or the powerful Sages? I remembered… but who was I? A boy. A man. Cursed by the Goddesses. Blessed by the Goddesses. A commoner. A hero. Shaped by the kingdom’s needs, formed to meet its desires. With its desires met, the kingdom didn’t want to remember what could have been, should have been...

            I represent everything they’d like to forget.

            My hands slowly fell from my face. I forced my body to rise, to walk toward the entrance of the cave mouth.

            Someone remembered.

            Who?

            Who would want to remember that hell? The time skeletons wielded swords, of ghosts who’d draw your soul into their lantern if given a chance, of the wolves who walked more like men but attacked travelers with howls and claws, hoping for an easy kill? Of the decrypted hands that crept along the rafters, waiting to drop down? The mummified corpuses whose voices would freeze your body and heart as they wrapped you into a putrid hug, one you might never escape? The rustling sound of spiders, ones that you could hear but never find…

            Why remember that?

            The stars dotted the sky, pinpricks poked into the tapestry of darkness. The moon hung, gleaming down, a brooch of white against the night. There were no howls of wolves now, no roaming skeletons of any kind. Perhaps when Ganondorf was sealed to rest, all the other spirits settled back into peace and the monsters retreated.

            What is left for me?

            I am a hero with no battle, a sword with no fight, as useful as a marionette without strings. I am not needed, unwanted. My purpose has been served and my life is a loose end, unnecessary. Yet I still wonder over this other who remembers… do they know me? Did I see them in my travels? A small part of me instantly thinks of Sheik but I crush the lighthearted flutter with cold reality.

            He never was.

            My thoughts are diverted as I notice some flashes of light to my right. Little green glows that light up for a brief moment then fade only to relight a short distance away. Fireflies. Little, tiny fireflies.

            Navi.

            It hit me so hard that I swear the wind was knocked from my lungs. Navi. She’d been with me through the whole hell of it. She’d traveled to and from with me, diverged in the past and future. It would stand to reason that she, out of all others, would remember.

            I leaned back against the cave’s outer walls; mind struggling to recall the last time I’d seen her. It’d been quiet for so long that I’d taken it for granted… the last time I saw her, heard from her, she’d been in the Temple of Time with me. I’d replaced the Master Sword and she flew away, up toward one of the glass windows. She might have said something, “goodbye” or “farewell,” I don’t remember. I think some part of me thought that she’d just be away for a few days, that she’d return. But she hadn’t…

            She would remember. Navi would remember. I had to find her, I had to know…

           I’m not alone.
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The Flow of Time

Chapter Four: A Hero’s Quest