Day 2, 8:30 AM, 45 hours left until impact.
This had to have been the first time that Link had slept since she’d left the Ranch. It felt so good to finally catch a wink of rest (even if time-traveling rendered it unnecessary), and a lengthy one at that (thanks to the slowed time stream). More importantly, it was with a comfortable bed below her and someone to share it with-
Something about that last statement didn’t make sense to the time traveler. She looked down the bed. Link had fallen asleep facing the door, there were arms wrapped around her torso-
Ding! Something was wrong with that picture, and Lina figured it out. Lulu must have stumbled in during the night and fallen asleep next to her.
Slowly, Link broke free of the affectionate hold she had on her. She got up, left the building, and broke out the guitar.
Within seconds, time began to speed up to normal. Behind her, she could hear Lulu beginning to wake up.
’Show time.’
---------------------------
Day 2, 12:00 PM, 42 hours left until impact.
The final strings for the infamous ’audience choice’ song ran off her fingers like bullets from a gun, whipping the audience into a feverous frenzy.
The other band members, Lulu and Mikalu not included, started to drink. Just like last time.
When the coast was clear, Lina took off the mask. Just as she put it away, she encountered the singer of the Indigo-Gos.
Luckily, she had never seen this young kid before. ”Excuse me,” she asked, ”but have you see my wife?”
She didn’t have to give an excuse, but she did anyway. ”Yea, she actually told me to tell you something.”
Lulu leaned in to listen. ”She said that she was going to try and find something pretty for you. Said it might take her a while for her ’pearl of the sea’.”
The Zora blushed, but thanked the young girl. Link, meanwhile, called for Rauru, who had been hiding in the beams holding up the stage.
As he landed, one of his wings rubbed the spot where his left ear would’ve been if he were human. ”It vibrates like no tomorrow up there.”
Tatl flew down after him, decrying, “I told you last time, and I told you this time, it would’ve been smarter to wait outside!”
“Well, I forgot! You’re allowed to forget things when you’re over two hundred years old!”
Link laughed heartily at Rauru’s absentmindedness. “Anyway, we’ve gotta get back to town. You up for it?”
The Sage of Light understood the question. “Maybe to the beach. It’s a little iffy.”
--------------------
Day 2, 1:47 PM, 40 hours until impact.
They were nearly at the beach before Rauru lost his grip, causing Lina to land in the shallows of the bay.
She spat out a mouthful of water and a small fish before looking angrily at her guardian. He landed, out of breath, on the beach.
As Link walked back toward land, her stomach began to hurt once more, like someone had crushed it.
Finally on land, she pulled out the Ocarina and played Epona’s Song. On cue, the wild but faithful horse galloped over the horizon and onto the sands. As Link mounted the pony, she looked out into the ocean.
She wanted to go home. As... unique as Termina was, she preferred Hyrule. She missed the good meals in the morning. She missed being in a place where people were just living life. Hell, she even missed the manure-shoveling labor (not really).
But most of all, Lina missed Malon. Desperately. Maddeningly. Too much to put into words.
She rode out, dong her best not to break down. There was another, more disturbing thought on her mind.
‘Since when was I so emotional?’
------------------
Day 2, 3:30 PM, 37 hours until impact.
Link had already walked around Clock Town enough times in enough timelines to know what was going to happen where, when, and who was going to be involved.
As she walked by the bank (which was really just a beggar who kept the money safe), she noticed three dancers. One was a man in his thirties, while the other two were young adult ladies.
She recognized these three- they were learning an odd sort of dance class.
She looked at the clock tower. 3:35. It wasn’t like she had anything better to do.
Lina walked up to the teacher, asking what kind of dance they were doing. Besides making weird gestures and gesticulations with two women in fancy bathrobes, that is.
“I’m teaching these two women the Festival Courting Dance.”
“...What?”
The teacher sighed. “Great, I have to explain it to an idiot.”
Perturbed by her teacher’s insult, the taller of the two students spoke. “Mr. Roboto, maybe she’s from out of town.”
The shorter apprentice concurred, adding, “Maybe she’s moving in, Mr. Roboto.”
“Alright, I was just having a bit of fun.” She threw what appeared to be another fancy robe at her. “Put the kimono on.”
The red kimono was made of a material that she couldn’t place (“Silk,” Mr. Roboto claimed), and had small white flowers imprinted on it.
“Alright, let’s begin. Now, don’t be surprised if it takes a couple of weeks to get the basics down...”
But it didn’t take Link ‘weeks’. In fact, given the free time she had, she quickly became an expert. There was an ulterior motive besides ‘timewaster’. The dance made her forget her troubles. For a brief moment, she forgot that she had been turned into a girl. She forgot that she was stuck in an alternate version of Hyrule. She even forgot about that stomachache that she’d been dealing with for the past couple of days.
That thing had started the instant she had cured the Deku curse, and it had never stopped since. Perhaps going back in time reset her bodily functions. Or maybe she was just over thinking things.
Regardless, it was 9:00 PM before the teacher let the three go. “It’s about time to close up shop for the night.”
Link took off the kimono, and was about to hand it back when he held his hand out in protest. “No, I think you should keep it. You’ve earned it.”
"Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto."
As the group separated, Link walked back to the clock tower. Rauru and Tatl were both waiting for her.
As she began to climb up to the platform to the stairwell, Tatl jabbed, “Any more bright ideas on how to waste time?”
Link responded by putting the Ocarina to her mouth. At first, it sounded like she was playing the Song of Time, but this too was different. Each note was played twice. Shortly after the song, the town reacted as if someone had pointed a remote control at it and pressed the ‘Fast Forward’ button.
People ran around, trying to get to bed. The hands of the clock kept spinning, the sun set, rose again, and set, and people were scrambling to find shelter, until time began to slow down at...
-----------------
Day 3, 12:00 AM, 6 hours until impact.
The clock began to ring twelve times, and she ran up the stairway once again.
Just like last time, the Skull Kid was yelling, this time, though, he only had Tate to yell at.
“Tate, what are you staring at?"
His head swiveled to look at whatever it was the yellow fairy was peering at, now noticing the presence of a certain cursed boy-gone-girl. "You're too late, Hero! You only have six hours to save this land, and there's nothing you can do!! Now, I'm going to fly around in circles and taunt you until my work is complete! BWAHAAHAHAHAHAAAAAHAAA!"
The exact same speech as last time. Oh well. Link dug out the Ocarina, and called forth the four giants.
Tate began screaming something very incoherent. "The swamp... the mountain... the bay... the valley... the four who are there-"
Only this time, the fairy was interrupted by the appearance of four large giants, which pushed back on the falling moon. The mask shrieked in anger as its carefully-laid plan went astray.
Majora’s Mask detached itself as the moon started to go back into its proper orbit. “It’s... not... over... Hero...”
She felt a pulling sensation on her feet, as she began to rise into the air. It actually felt just like all those times when she had been teleported out of the dungeon after beating the boss. This time would prove to be slightly different. As he went higher, she lost consciousness.
-------------
Where was she? More importantly, WHEN was she? All she could see was black and green.
Lina woke up, to find her face in the grass. That made no sense- because just moments ago, she had been on top of the Clock Tower- a wooden building.
“Tatl? Rauru?”
Rauru was nowhere to be found, but Tatl still hung by her side. “Where are we, Lina?”
The sky was whiter than snow. There were four children playing in the grassy emptiness. Each of these boys wore a mask; each mask looked just like one of the ones that Link had collected from the four bosses.
In the distance, Link could make out a tree, and under that tree was a lonely fifth boy, who wore-
‘Majora’s Mask.’
She took a step, and ended up stepping on yet another mask- but this one was much different than all the others that she had seen. It looked like her.
That is, it would look like her, if she was pale, had silver hair, and wore a silverfish purple Kokiri hat. And if she had dark, black eyes. The thing creeped her out, but she took it, suspecting that it might come in handy in the future.
Tatl looked at the mask and shuddered. “Lina... that’s the Fierce Deity.”
“Deity?’
“It’s supposed to be the only thing that Majora feared. But what’s it doing here?”
Regardless of why the thing was there, she kept it, suspecting it might come in handy in the future.
Link walked past the four kids, who were trying to play ‘Smear the Queer’. She approached the fifth kid, who looked at her excitedly.
“Are... you here to play with me?”
An odd question, one that took Link by surprise. “Uh, sure. Yeah.”
The tree, the kid, everyone was gone. Link and Tatl were still there, as well as Majora’s Mask, no longer constrained by a face. The sky was replaced by a square room with walls ripped straight out of a kaleidoscope.
“So... it’ssss your turn... Hero...”
The mask turned around, and zoomed towards Lina’s face. Out of instinct, she grabbed at the face wear as it attempted to plant itself on her mug. Even with the Golden Gauntlets, it was inching closer, the dark magicks of the mask beginning to overpower her gloves.
“Tatl...”
The fairy did not turn to face her, staring at the mask.
“Get a mask out...” The mask edged even closer, Link’s strength starting to fail her.
The purple pixie finally turned to face Link, asking, “Which one?”
It was inches away now- “Any of them, I don’t care!”
Tatl disappeared, and then reappeared, holding the Fierce Deity’s Mask in mid-air. With an unspoken agreement, she thrust that mask onto Link’s face.
The mask backed off angrily, as if it had been touched by something discomforting. Link tried to scream, but the voice that escaped from her was not of this world. Her limbs, her body, her chest, all felt like they had exploded. Her face burned from contact with it, but there was a strange tingling feeling after a moment. Link couldn’t quite place a word for it for a good minute until she finally found one.
Power.
She felt power. Gobs of it.
Majora’s Mask, sensing perhaps that the only mask it ever feared was now in possession of the Hero/ine of Time, expanded into a star-shaped body, tentacles flying every which way, like a monster from a bad Japanese porno.
Fierce Deity Link finally finished the transformation, now resembling a grown eighteen-year old woman from a lesser known warrior tribe. Her tunic had been replaced by plate armor, her now pale face covered with red war paint, her hat was no longer the trademark green but a shade of purple. The Gilded Sword had changed as well, now taking the appearance of a double helix.
Striking quickly, the mask sent two tentacles at the fighter. She parried, swinging her sword to bat one of them away. As she did, a beam of rainbow light shot out from the tip of the blade, making impact with the center of Majora’s Wrath.
The mask howled in pain, the sword shrieked in odium, and the young boy-gone-girl-gone-crazed-curse-word ran at the beast full-speed, jumping over another tentacle. The magic of the Roc’s Feather allowed her to jump high enough to avoid the next tentacle, and she slashed the star-shaped one across the chest.
Yet another limb now ripped itself out of the Wrath’s back, strangling Lina. It lifted her off the ground, shaking her wildly.
She couldn’t breathe. The offending appendage tightened, making Link’s eyes feel like they were popping out of her head. Her face was probably turning plaid by now, her sword vibrating in her hand. There was a sickeningly green energy flowing through it, traveling along its edges to the tip.
Another tentacle closed in, preparing to snap her neck-
The green orb of power on her sword fired through the monster before it ever got the chance. It looked as if the tentacle monster had been impaled upon a giant beam of green Jello. There was a scream, followed by what sounded like the crack of thunder.
The mask fell to the floor, its evil influence confined to its accessorizing prison. The rainbow sky returned to the snow like essence, the children popping back into view.
Deity Link approached her foe, expecting some form of reprisal. But it never came. She took her giant sword and stabbed it. It moaned an evil hiss as dark clouds of magic escaped from cracks that formed, increasing in thickness and frequency, until Majora’s Mask exploded.
She turned around and saw the four kids, only the fifth one had joined them. Somehow, he still wore Majora’s Mask, even though she had just shattered it into a billion shards.
Somehow, she felt a compulsion unlike anything she’d ever felt before.
Lina’s feet moved on their own accord, the sword in her left hand rising to strike the little kids down-
DO IT!
DO IT NOW!
‘What the hell?’
A voice like her own had sounded off- albeit one more dark and distorted, almost in joyous agony.
KILL! KILL!!!
The sword was raised to slice the five children down, all of whom stared frightfully at her. She could almost see the fear in their eyes- granted, their eyes were obscured by masks, but you got the idea.
RIP THEIR HEADS FROM THEIR SPINES!
Was the mask doing this? Giving her this insatiable feeling of bloodlust?
DO IT, AND YOU SHALL HAVE POWER BEYOND YOUR WILDEST DREAMS!!!
Using whatever strength she had left, she threw the sword away, forcing her hands to her face to peel off the mask.
The mask began yelling in tongues she could not and did not want to understand. As the mask peeled off, Link returned to normal (well, normal for a twelve-year old boy who’s been turned into a girl). The Fierce Deity Mask was shaking sadistically, trying to reapply itself to her face.
No longer restrained by the magic of the mask, she threw it on the ground and drew her bow. Something began to try to emerge from the mask, and it looked just like Link. But it just couldn’t move out fast enough to avoid Lina’s Light Arrow.
The mask grew black in a sea of light before beginning to shrink. Eventually, it just disappeared. It was similar to how many of the monsters in Ganon’s Castle had been taken down.
As it died, the scenery changed, no longer a grassy field with a tree and kids, but now returned to the front of the Clock Tower.
------------------------
Day 4, 10:45 AM, Impact Averted.
The residents of Clock Town were in merry celebration today. The Festival had started earlier than usual, with people running around covered in home-made masks.
As Link climbed back down to the ground, she was eagerly met by many of those whom she’d helped during her adventure.
Anju and Cremia hugged her, the two of them wearing masks of the sun and the moon, respectively. Kafei thanked her freely, wearing what appeared to be a crude version of his own face.
As she made her way through the crowd, she felt slightly lighter. She checked her person to confirm this, only to find that she was missing a few masks-
“Looking for us?”
Lina whipped around to find the unthinkable- Dina, Darmuni, and Mikalu were all standing, alive and beaming. Dina was holding hands with the Deku Princess, Mikalu was in a loving embrace with Lulu, and Darmuni smiled at Lina, her arms crossed.
Link understood that the magic of the masks had broken once Majora was destroyed- they could finally return to their lives.
“But how-“
The Princess held up her hand. “It’s tradition for a member of the Royal Family to attend the Festival of Time.”
Lulu looked at Lina knowingly. “Plus, the band has a gig for this year’s show.” She bent over and whispered in Link’s ear, “I am SO sorry about, well, all that-“
“No problem.”
Darmuni kept grinning at Link before finally having her say. “I can’t say I’ve ever been at the Festival. The Elder usually has me learning how to become a leader for my people and all that bull.”
With that, the group left, and Link began to walk back toward the Clock Tower.
That is, she would’ve, until she ran into a similarly sized person wearing a mask that look like a stone with a face. During the fall, the mask fell off her face, revealing-
“No way.”
The person that she had collided into looked very much like her, only this one wore a blue shirt with what appeared to be white shrimp, her pants a burnt orange. Was this the Termina version of-
“You okay, Shrimp Girl?”
Both Links looked at a familiar redhead wearing a cow hoodie. Romani held out her hand to the blue Lina, and noticed that there was a green-garbed Lina next to this one.
As the blue Lina rose, Romani explained it to the green one. “Lina, this is Shandra. We go way back.”
The blue shirted blonde shyly held out her hand, which Link hesitantly accepted, still thunderstruck by this last minute revelation. ‘The Termina version of me is a girl too?!?’
“Are you gonna leave now?”
Link looked at Rauru, who had taken perch on a nearby platform, before answering Romani’s question. “Yea. Take care, ‘kay?”
Romani hugged her companion affectionately before replying, “Oh yes! Shandra said that she’d come help out around the farm, so everything’s gonna be alright!”
Shandra blushed bashfully before nodding at that statement.
“Bye, Lina!” She ran off for the nearby dancing area, Shandra in hand. Shandra smiled meekly, said, “Thanks for everything,” and was jerked away by a redhead with an itch to dance.
On a nearby platform, Link could see the Skull Kid talking to both Tatl and Tate, who appeared to be very apologetic. After a good five minutes, he finished, and the purple fairy floated over to Link.
“Well, I gotta go.”
“Where?”
“Back with the Skull Kid. We’re gonna play with the Giants.”
“Wait... the Skull Kid is a friend of the Giants?”
“Yea! I told you that right after you took down the giant swordsman for the first time, remember?”
She actually didn’t- she had been asleep during that whole story. Nevertheless, she nodded her head in agreement.
“Anyway, I guess this is goodbye.”
Link understood. Tatl had never planned to stay with Link- they both knew that the only thing that kept them together was Majora’s Mask. And now that it was gone, they would not continue to travel as Hero/ine and fairy.
Rauru flew over to Link, landing on her shoulder as she walked into the Clock Tower. Creepo Mathews rose from his organ bench and faced the Hylian duo. “You did it. But where’s the mask?”
Link made a cutting gesture, while Rauru answered, “From what I’ve been told, it was destroyed.”
The Mask Dealer cringed at that last word. “I was hoping that wouldn’t be the case. I was supposed to deliver that mask to Ganondorf.”
Link gasped, but regained her logical footing. “But you said to stop it by ‘any means necessary’!”
“I know! I mean, I can probably get away with telling him that it was taken from me by a bandit, but he’s not going to be too pleased.”
He lost his trademark grin for a moment before getting it back. “But I suppose it’s finally time to leave, eh?”
Mathews walked to the back of the foundation before fiddling at a wood beam located next to Epona. As if by magic, a door swung forth from wall, beam included.
Link walked to the passage, only to notice that Mr. Mathews wasn’t following.
“You honestly can’t expect me to go to the King of Evil and be the bearer of bad news, can you? No, I’ll go back in a year or so.”
Link walked into the darkness with her horse in tow, prepared to return to the land she knew so well.
As the door closed behind her, Rauru reminded her of the next task at hand.
“Remember, we still need to fix the time discrepancy with the Princess and Malon. Remember that.”
---------------------------------
After what seemed like a walk into eternal darkness, she finally saw a glimpse of light. Before rushing toward it, Link reached for a change of clothes, only to find that she hadn’t brought any with her. In fact, the only other item she had to clothe her was the kimono that Mr. Roboto had given her. Not wanting to risk being recognized, she changed her outfit.
When she finally met the light, she saw houses craved into trees. Green everywhere. She’d made it her childhood home. To the Kokiri Forest.
“Hail!”
“Hail General Onox!”
That authoritative shout brought Link’s attention to the floor of the forest. There appeared to be a small legion of giant armored shaved dogs, or Darknuts, marching through the forest. At the head of this army appeared to be a giant in golden armor, probably this General Onox.
To his right was a girl with blue hair, blue dress and very oddly shaded skin. It almost appeared to be a sickly blue. The person on his left appeared to be magically imprisoned in a blue crystal, which almost completely obscured her red dancing dress.
She sensed people in distress, and quickly prepared to fire a volley at this so called “General”.
Lina was about to fire when her right arm was grabbed by an armored gauntlet. She turned to find a human wearing Darknut armor.
“Hey-“
The disguised man gestured to keep quiet. “Look, I wanna off him too, but later. Not here.”
As he let go, Link noticed that this mysterious man was taking off the stolen helmet, revealing red bangs of hair, a blue hat with golden trimming, and a determined look in his face.
He took off his right gauntlet and held out his hand. “I might as well introduce myself. Name’s Ralph, Guardian for the Oracle of Ages.”
Deviant Hearts Archive | Back to main index