Chapter Text
Link clung to Champion, his stomach flipping as they descended toward the surface, dodging sky island chunks in their flight, led by the mysterious green light emitted from the front of the owl mask. Down, down, toward a gap between two mountains.
The glider scraped against the uneven stone surface, skidding as the fans puttered out. Link hopped off the side, a little wobbly on his feet. Rauru’s magic squelched as Champion unstuck the mask from the beak of the glider, floating it over to the next pedestal, where it seemed to be indicating them to place it.
While it wasn’t the first time Link had come across a secret dungeon entrance, he thought this one particularly obvious. While Champion fiddled with the mask, trying to align it with the pedestal, Link walked around the area, examining the tall stone bird statue, the high walls, the cracked stone walkway, and the rippling pools beside them.
“What are you thinking?” Spryte asked, flitting around him as he took stock of the area.
Link stopped just in front of the bird, squinting up at the underside of its moss-covered beak. “Ten rupees says this thing slides out of the way and reveals a cave into the mountain.”
Something clicked behind him. Magical energy hummed. Puffs of long-resting dirt lifted into clouds. The stone rumbled beneath Link’s feet. Then it rose.
Link let out a yelp of surprise, the rumbling leaving him off balance and sending him crashing onto his ass. Higher and higher the bird flew, the stone he had been standing on lifting into the air. He scrambled to the side, away from the bird, Champion and the mysterious mask getting farther away by the second. “Champion! Help!”
Champion, as startled by the sudden movement as he was, yanked the mask from the pedestal. The glow immediately ceased. The stone locked into place, only fifteen feet above the ground. As he held it, the mask in Champion’s hands glowed again, shooting out another bright green light from its center.
Still shaken by the encounter, Link slid carefully off the side of the statue’s base, using the paraglider to soften his fall. Spryte flitted by him to peer into the newly formed cave. “Oh my!”
“T-told you. Secret cave in the mountain.” Link cleared his throat, trying to appear braver than he felt.
“Perhaps, but you said it would slide,” Spryte corrected, holding out her hand to him. “Ten rupees, then!”
“Gh!” Link scoffed, hooking his paraglider back onto his belt. “No way! It did slide! It just slid upward!”
“That doesn’t count!” Spryte argued.
“Does too!”
“Does not!”
“Children, the quest?” Champion reminded them, gesturing with his head that they should follow him down the stairs and into the cave.
Sticking their tongues out at each other, Spryte and Link acquiesced to the more pressing matter, following Champion into the cave, one step at a time toward the next pedestal. Standing beside Champion this time, Link waited for the mask to click into place. “Alright, so this time the door will definitely slide-”
The grate platform on which they stood shuddered.
“Oh, come on!” Link groaned, stamping his foot onto the strange metal floor as it lowered, inch by inch, into the darkness, dust and dirt cascading like waterfalls around them. “Can’t you let me be right just once?!”
Two artificial brightblooms lit the cavern as they descended, illuminating the brown dirt and stone, yet leaving the rest of the chasm in total darkness. Link shivered, the cool of the cave chilling his clothes, still damp from their adventures in the Sky.
“Link.”
Both boys jumped, startled by the sudden voice. Feminine, deliberate, yet with the same tinkling magic hum that accompanied the other sages. If there was any doubt of the purpose of their mission, the appearance of this voice wiped it away.
“Zelda’s chosen protector.”
The heroes stared at each other, then at the mask, as if expecting it to turn around and start speaking to them directly.
“You must hurry…We must meet as soon as possible.”
Link rubbed his arms, the chill deepening the further they descended. “You know, I don’t like the way she said ‘chosen’.”
Champion turned back to him, giving Link a look like he’d suggested jumping off the platform and into the dark abyss. “Excuse me?”
Link shrugged. “It sounded a little judgy. Like, ‘Zelda chose you, I wouldn’t have, but I guess we’re stuck with you.’”
Spryte nodded in agreement, tinkling with her own magic. “I was just thinking the same thing. Very judgy.”
The amount of self-restraint Champion exhibited bordered on legendary. He merely rolled his eyes and took some of the gloom-resistant armor wrappings from his bag, handing some to Link for them both to put on. “You two are ridiculous.”
Down they descended into the inky blackness. A single spot of light grew larger as they approached, vague white and gray slowly taking form into a structure, not unlike the Zonai mines they had come across in their earlier travels. The platform locked into place on the ground. Two unlit lightroots gave off faint orange light: one behind, one on the other side of the structure.
Curiously, Link stepped toward the mysterious building, squinting at something in the very center of the lower floor. “What’s-?”
The sudden firing of the guiding laser beside him made Link yelp and jump back, far more skittish now that they were back in the Depths. He clutched his chest, trying to calm his rampant heart rate. “Goddess, really?”
The mask made no reply beyond unlatching itself from the pedestal, its feather-like pieces flaring out to loosen it from the stand.
Once again grabbing it with Ultrahand, Champion led the way down the stairs and toward the center of the unusual structure, following the guiding light. “Come on.”
The odd object in the center of the structure had the same composition as the mask, bronze and Zonaite. A mask-shaped hole glowed with a pulsing green light, the guiding laser centered on it. When Champion raised it to the hole, the mask snapped into place.
Magic hummed around them once more.
“Link…Zelda’s chosen protector…”
“That sounded less bitchy this time,” Spryte noted.
“Would you shut up?!” Champion hissed back at them, shooting both Spryte and Link a glare and pointing at them like a frustrated teacher.
The sage, as Link thought the voice must belong to her, did not appear much put-off by their bickering. “My name is Mineru. I am the Sage of Spirit.”
“Oh shit,” Link whispered to Spryte, this time quiet enough that he hoped Champion didn’t scold them again, “isn’t the name of the poe from the last dragon memory?”
“I am happy you have arrived. At last, we can speak with each other.” The sage continued. “Unfortunately, I no longer have a body. Without a physical form, we cannot yet speak face-to-face.” The idea of getting possessed by a poe in search of a physical body hadn’t occurred to him before, though now he was very much considering the possibility. “But, do you see the four storehouses in the area?” Green lights sprang to life in the distance, lighting up four stone archways. Link barely suppressed the urge to speak aloud how creepy that was. “I would ask you to visit each of them and assemble a body for me. This is my request to you, Link, loyal swordsman to Zelda.”
The voice faded, leaving the heroes alone in the eerie silence of the Depths.
Champion wrapped his gloom-resistant bandages tightly around his feet and ankles, tucking the knots in at his knees. “Alright. Sounds straightforward enough. I’ll activate the lightroot and take the storehouses on the right; you take the ones on the left. Sound good?”
As much as Link hated the idea of separating from Champion down here, he didn’t want Champion to know that. He had at least some semblance of masculine courage to maintain. “Yeah, no problem! Come on, Spryte. Bet we can gather up the pieces faster than him anyway.”
The smallest hint of a smile flickered across Champion’s lips, despite the projected annoyance. “I’ll take you up on that challenge. Last one to put in a piece has to pay for the room at the next inn.”
Now that was a bet! Link held out his hand, shaking Champion’s to mark the wager. “You’re on, hero.”
Wasting no more time (and not waiting for Champion to activate the lightroot), Link sprinted toward the first storehouse, tossing brightblooms out in front of him to illuminate the path.
Upon entering the first storehouse, the bright green activation screen appeared, glowing softly in the darkness. Link cursed under his breath. “Shit. That’s a bust. Looks like we’ll need Champion after all.”
His fairy sprung from his shoulder, flitting over to the activation rune. “Not necessarily!” She circled around the rune several times, examining it from different angles. “Hmmm.” Turning her eyes upward, toward another glowing light, she gasped. “I’ve got it!”
“You can activate the rune?” Link asked, hopeful.
“Oh, no, this isn’t my kind of magic.” She flew up higher, where another, softer light was visible through a metal grate. “But I can move this!”
A flurry of sparkles shot out from her tiny hands toward the light, sprinkling down over the metal tube. Something mechanical scraped and slid, pieces of stone-like metal shifting around. The bottom of the tube slid open, letting the light-filled object fall out, where it clattered to the ground.
Link jogged over to it, examining the strange, Zonaite appendage within the prism. “Nice!”
Bars slammed closed over the entrance.
Link spun on his heel, realizing they were now trapped. “Not nice! What’s our backup plan, Spryte?”
“Um…” Spryte flew up high, looking around in the dark. “Oh! There’s another exit up here!” As she started to fly toward it, she stopped, realizing she had left Link behind. “Oops, forgot you can’t fly.”
“Not a Rito, unfortunately.” Link confirmed, showing off his featherless arms. Not that flying would do him much good in getting the prism out of there. He tried to lift up the block, straining to get it more than a few inches off the ground. “Oof. Not a Goron either.” He frowned, thinking through the problem. “If I had some power bracelets, this would be a piece of cake.”
Spryte flew back over to him, landing on his shoulder. “I don’t know if my magic is strong enough to lift this thing out of here. I can’t even lift you.”
Link scratched his head. “Yeah, that’s not going to work.” He looked around the chamber, spotting two platforms with Zonai rockets. A rail of bronze ran up the stone wall behind the platforms. “Spryte, can you help me get this thing onto one of those platforms over there?”
“I can sure try!” Spryte sprinkled bits of her magic over the prism, giving Link just enough reduced weight to pull it up the stairs and onto the rail-bound platform. When he dropped it down, it clanged hard against the metal, nearly squishing his toes. But still, it was up. Link gave the rocket nearest him a whack.
The platform surged upward, sending the prism, Link, and Link’s stomach, straight into the air. They crashed down on the second floor of the chamber, the prism skidding toward a few more Zonai rockets in a pile of dirt and crumbling stone.
After taking a second to recover from the rush, Link faced his next problem. He’d gotten up one level, but now found himself equally trapped on the second. The giant wheel, he deduced quickly enough, raised and lowered the angle of yet another rail, though this one didn’t hold a platform. It was, however, the perfect size for the prism to fit into it.
With the prism firmly in the rail’s guards, Link went back to the wheel, pushing it until he thought the angle was just perfect.
“Um, Link, what are you doing?” Spryte asked, watching him curiously.
Link clapped the dust off his hands, walking over to the pile of rubble. “I know you said you couldn’t activate the runes, but-” He grunted as he hoisted a Zonai rocket from the dusty earth. “Can you make this stick to the box?”
Spryte’s eyes lit up in surprise. “Ooh! Probably!” She waited for Link to place the rocket exactly where he wanted it to go, then hit it with her magic. While not the green, Zonai goo that Champion’s Ultrahand produced, a strong bond of magic wrapped around the prism and the rocket, binding them together as if by a rope of light.
Piece by piece, Link constructed his own rocket-powered platform. When it was decked out to his satisfaction, he took a step back. “Alright, let’s see if this actually holds together.” Hopping onto his stuck-on steering stick, Link planted his feet firmly on the marks and twisted the handle.
Rockets bursts to life, propelling him up and across the small body of dark water, zipping along the angle Link had created. When they crashed into another pool on the next floor up, Link scrambled to claw his way out of the murky water. Stagnation dripped from his hair and soaked into his clothes (not that they were very dry to begin with). But, he was up, and on the same level with the exit.
“Spryte,” Link declared, half-dragging the prism onto the next dry piece of floor, “I think we may just give Old Man Champion a run for his money.”
Though a piece of the construct was already in position by the time Link and Spryte got to it, now that they had a method, victory became attainable. After another series of creative solutions, their second piece now was freed from the storehouse. When Link dragged his final prism out of the water and across the gray earth, Champion was nowhere to be found.
“We’ve got him now, Spryte!” Link cheered, yanking the construct piece up the stairs bit by bit. “Champion will feel real silly getting bested by a guy without any magi-”
A burst shook the air and screeched toward him. Right in front of his face, in a blur of Zonai magic, the fourth piece slammed into the partially-assembled construct. Zonai rockets sputtered out as Champion climbed off his final prism, shaking the Ultrahand glue from it.
“No fair!” Link whined, still huffing to get his up the stairs. “How’d you get through that so quickly?!”
As if noticing Link for the first time, Champion gave Link an incredulous look. “How’d you get through it at all? How did you activate the depots?”
Spryte crossed her arms and gave Champion a smug grin. “Fairy secret.”
Dejected, Link knew when he had to admit defeat. He let Champion place the final pieces.
The assembled construct hummed with energy, the same that had surged through every other construct they’d met along their journey, light streaming between rings of green Zonaite. The construct shuddered, puttered, and finally took a step. Now that it was moving, Link realized how tall it really was. Even if he stood on Champion’s shoulders, he still couldn’t see this thing eye to eye!
Luckily, the construct lowered its head, first examining Champion, and then staring at Link, a faint glow in its otherwise hauntingly hollow mechanical eyes. It reared back to its full height, towering over them. The same feminine voice emerged, though this time more clearly coming from the construct itself. “Which of you is the swordsman Link?”
The heroes traded amused looks.
“That’s a bit of a long story,” Champion answered. “Technically, both of us. We kind of share the same-”
“Soul.” Mineru supplied, her construct’s head tilting as it examined them again.
Link blinked up at the construct, startled by that pronouncement. “What?”
“You have the same spirit.” Mineru explained, the construct nodding to them. “Very strange. Princess Zelda only mentioned one hero, not two.”
Alarmed, and slightly put-off by the sage’s conclusion, Link turned to Champion, gesturing for him to explain.
Champion, for his part, appeared at as much of a loss as Link. “Uh, right. She wouldn't know about Zaps. He kind of…showed up. He’s a hero from another era. He kinda got dragged into this one.”
“Time travel.” Mineru mused, her voice humming slightly. “Interesting. I know of no other way for a soul to reside in two bodies and be whole in both of them.” She turned, pointing a mechanical hand into the distance. “In any case, my secret stone is sealed away not far from here. I will require it for the upcoming battle.” She knelt down. “Climb onto my back. This construct is impervious to gloom, which I sense is prevalent along our path.”
Allowing Champion to climb on first, Link stayed behind a moment, his mind reeling. He watched Champion more closely, taking note of the way he grabbed, climbed, and scouted. While Link thought he recognized himself in a mirror, he began to wonder.