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sciencelings-writes · 2 years ago

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Forever Changed

AO3 Link

WC: 8318

Ganondorf was gone, obliterated into ash that fluttered down on Hyrule Field, Zelda was back, a feat they had been convinced wasn’t possible, but that didn’t mean it was over. Or that life would ever be anywhere close to normal ever again.

Though it was a surprise that the princess could come back at all, it wasn’t much of a shock to Link when she returned with nothing between her skin and the open air. They had seen how she had transformed, even through the bright light radiating from her chest, how her form stretched and morphed into something new. Her dress and jewelry left hopelessly torn to pieces at the altar in which she sacrificed her life.

It wasn’t a graceful transition, the hero could still hear how she screamed, though out of pain or terror, they weren’t quite sure. How that scream turned into the roar of a massive beast that echoed through the walls of the temple and sent ripples through the clouds. The last drops of humanity left falling through tears to the world below.

By now Link was used to falling, diving through the air as it ripped through their clothes and hair, They were familiar with how to cut through it like a zora through water. Reaching their plummeting partner was a task they determined they would never fail at again.

Their teeth clenched as their arm reached for her, they forgot how charred it had been from Ganondorf’s first attack. Rauru’s arm wasn’t there to protect them from the injury any longer. The pain that arced through it over a simple stretch made their breath stutter from how overwhelming it was. It was hardly bearable, but Link had been through far worse and such pain had never been the thing to stop them before. Especially when they were this close to getting her back.

With an arm that quivered in agony and reluctantly moved like it was made of stone, they took Zelda’s limply outstretched hand. She was desperately pulled into their arms without a moment's hesitation. Link braided their legs together to protect hers from flailing behind them and held her securely against them as they dropped.

It was too much to try to think of a way to save them, on top of the blinding pain and the pure unfiltered relief that she was back in their arms. Safe and with a heart audibly beating against the artery their ear had pressed against as they buried their head in the crook of her neck. Not even the vicious wind could reach where their tears met her skin.

Link didn’t see the ground fast approaching, if they were really plummeting to their deaths, they preferred to enjoy the few moments left. After all this time all they had wanted was to get her back, at the very least they had that again.

The shrieking of the air around them crescendoed to an all-encompassing crash before a wave of silence surrounded them. As well as the sudden rush of cool water into every crevice. It seemed as though the goddess would grant them a single mercy by not allowing them to be killed on impact.

For a moment, they were knocked around and it quickly became difficult to tell what direction up was, even when Link opened their eyes, the movement of the water scattered light in all directions. It was only when their feet met the rocky floor of the pond that they were able to figure that they had completely flipped orientation in the chaos of the water.

They readjusted their grip on Zelda, holding her across their chest with most of her weight falling on their good arm. They thanked Hylia for the low gravity effect of the lake, it would’ve been nearly impossible to do in normal circumstances with how the pain in their arm was only growing.

Link kicked off the ground with enough force that it didn’t take too much more swimming to get to the surface. Thankfully the edge of the pond was nearby and the hero was able to stumble out of it before they could collapse in exhaustion. Though they weren’t that injured from the fight, the agony that shot through their arm at every slight movement sapped the little energy they had left from battlefield adrenaline.

Their knees hit the grass as soon as it transitioned out from a bed of sharp gravel. Their corrupted arm gave out the moment the tremor from nearly falling to the ground reached it. Link’s breath hitched and stuttered as the torturous feeling electrified their nerves until there was nothing left of them.

Catching their breath gave them a moment to notice that they weren’t the only one left irreparably changed.

Iridescent white scales lingered in patches around the princess's body, curling from under her breasts and trailing up her back to her shoulders in an imitation of armor. They led down her waist and hips, down to the side of her thighs, and got bigger the closer they got to her major joints. Beginning at her forearms and calves were black scales that covered her limbs like elegant gloves and stockings, leaving bright opalescent nails that were shaped more like talons, though were still flat.

Horns protruded from her hairline, wrapping around her nearly luminous golden locks like waving branches from a tree. Her hair was mildly tangled in her new wild crown that shifted between the blue of a tropical sea and rich cold violet that would be rare to find amongst the most beautiful of flowers.

Link felt the large golden scales going along her spine, intermittently being disrupted by a segmented crystalline spike, the shape of which mirrored thin flower petals and flattened when pressed down on, like a cluster of sparkling hedgehog quills set in a mosaic of shining metal.

She had yet to awaken, yet the hero had a feeling her eyes would flutter open any second now. They braced themselves with an inhale before forcing their charred arm to move once more, controlling the movement as much as they could with their upper arm in an attempt to mitigate the potential agony that was sure to return with vigor.

They managed to unhook the Purah Pad from their belt and gently tap on an icon in their inventory. A folden piece of cloth appeared at their side, though it was meant for a paraglider, it would also work as the easiest way to prevent Zelda from waking up completely naked. It acted as a large cloak that she could wrap herself in, at least temporarily. They were pretty sure she wouldn’t love waking up from an eon’s long coma without a single shred of cloth to cover her. Even if Link was the only one that saw, and even if they had seen it before.

The fabric had barely covered the princess's shoulders when the strain made Link’s vision white out for a moment, and leave them lightheaded. They begged for the sensation to pass as they squeezed their eyes shut. It was impossible to focus on anything but the flaring agony but they tried anyway. They tried to count their own heartbeat that rapidly pulsed in their ears or feel the cool wind against their wet skin but it was no use.

Just a little longer, they just had to hold out a little longer. It took more effort than it should’ve, but they managed to force their eyes open again.

At least the fight was over this time, the world wouldn’t be doomed if they keeled over. If they lost the battle against their own consciousness or their grip against the pulling force of death was weakened and crumbling, ultimately it wouldn’t matter. Zelda was back, and the dark evil was dispelled.

Perhaps that was how it was meant to end, it certainly sounded enticing. Link knew firsthand what a relief death could be. When all they knew was agony, death had been a temporary blessing. A comforting darkness where no physical pain could follow, where terror faded and all the pressures of life released into the ever-growing nothingness.

Death sounded pretty nice, but Link kind of wanted to survive this. They had just gotten Zelda back after so long and it might be a selfish thought, but all they wanted to do was enjoy their princess's return. They wanted so desperately to hear her voice and see her smile again after letting her fall from their grasp and losing her to more than just the pit of shadows.

“Link? How did- Are you-” Their eyes flicked up to her face from where they had landed while they had tried to focus on not collapsing.

They thought they had identified all the changes that had been made but one more grabbed their interest. Her irises, once a solid lush green were separated into two rings. The inner ring was that familiar emerald but the outer one reminded them of their own eye color, a seaside blue that nearly dipped into a ghostly aqua. They had a feeling most people would be disturbed by the princess's new appearance, but Link couldn’t help but simply find her even more beautiful than before.

“It’s okay, we did it,” Their voice was quiet and strained, like their throat was being squeezed by a large ghostly hand that refused to let them go.

“It’s really over?” she asked, sounding somewhere between hopeful and desperate. She didn’t break eye contact as she shifted to sit herself up, as if she wasn’t believing what was in front of her eyes. Link knew the feeling.

“You’re back home now,” they avoided the question, they had a feeling they wouldn’t come out of this completely unscathed.

In a moment, Zelda had sprung up and thrown herself into their arms, well, arm. They couldn’t bear to move the right one anymore. Her makeshift blanket dropped uselessly to the ground. Despite having forgone her mortal form for countless thousands of years, she was far more sure of her movements than Link was.

“Oh thank Hylia, I was so sure that I’d never see you again!” Her relieved laugh was near hysterical, the way her breath hitched hinted at the emergence of a sob.

Her arms were so tight around them, they had never felt so safe and secure in their life than when she embraced them. It was the same pair of arms that engulfed them after nightmares, forcing the residual effects away and replacing them with something far kinder. It was her arms that squeezed them so excitedly when she had been freed from the calamity and wrapped loosely atop their shoulders when joyful music found a reason to be played.

Maybe that’s why Link let go. There was no more reason to cling so desperately to life when they were already so sure that they were safe. It wouldn’t matter if they fell because there was already someone there to catch them.

Link couldn’t hear how her voice turned worried or how she frantically checked their pulse and seemed afraid to even touch their arm, like it could crumble to ashy pieces if she so much as felt it. She called their name, but the darkness had won its battle yet again. Once more, Link trusted their last remaining moments of life to her. Perhaps one day she will forgive them for it.

***

No one seemed to know what to do with themselves once Link had departed to fight the so-called ‘Demon King’, it hadn’t been officially announced but Purah had made sure that everyone was aware of what was going on in Lookout Landing. They were the closest crumb of civilization to where the mummy guy had chosen to hide himself away and if it was anything like last time, they were right in the middle of its warpath.

Many chose to hide in the royal family's emergency shelter, it was already set up to be a sturdy bunker and it was the safest place to be if something decided to emerge from the crater that once held most of the castle.

The brave were still above ground, anxiously waiting, not daring to try and occupy their time in any significant way. Many of the warrior types had convinced themselves that they could be of use, in case any creepy creatures came crawling out of the castle's crevice, but really, they were hoping to catch a glance of something legendary.

Time passed so slowly when there was a potential apocalypse on the horizon, but no one wanted to waste the time they had left working some meaningless job if they were all about to be decimated. It seemed like weeks had passed before anything seemed to happen.

The whole time Purah had been glued to her telescope, pointing directly at the hole Link and the Sages had disappeared into. At some point, she had convinced herself that the sight of the telescope was too limited so she climbed up into the mechanisms that kept the damn thing stable and freed the massive scope from its prison. At least now it could point at more than just the castle, with enough additional strength of course.

She wasn’t used to the settlement being so quiet. It wasn’t a populous place by any means but the last few hours had muffled its background chatter into an uneasy silence. She fidgeted with her recorder for a moment before jamming her face right back into the glass. Her eyes burned from refusing to blink, just in case she missed a single thing.

Sometimes she could swear that she heard the ground rumble, like there were massive beasts deep within the depths that had decided that they wanted out. But even in the quietness, she could never be sure. Her mind could just as easily be playing tricks on her, convincing her that something was happening, making up an imaginative story to fill the empty space.

At some point, she couldn’t blame her own delusion, the vibrations sent through the ground caused the lanterns lighting her guard tower to tremble, the wood making up the whole structure to creak and groan like it too was afraid of the coming minutes.

Purah didn’t let the tremors break her focus, not even when her parasol dropped from the tower and bounced off of the roof. Dust from the castle was starting to crumble into the scarlet chasm. Dust and pebbles became chunks and boulders, grumbling rock became something far more akin to an unearthly roar. It was only getting louder.

The scientist only whipped her head away from the lens when all she could see was a blur of dark smoke and blood-red fur. It was as if the whole settlement had all gasped as one, a chorus of horror rippled throughout the few that remained to see the spectacle, some voices were louder than others.

She didn’t let the shock stop her from furiously turning the telescope skyward, she needed to know what in demises name that thing was. She cursed when she could finally find its face.

“By the shadows, Link’s in its mouth!” She exclaimed loud enough to be heard over the fading dragon cry. She could barely see them struggling to escape its mighty maw before the sky thundered once more. Not from the demon that was nearly eating their hero, but from the other side of the sea of thick clouds.

Her Highness erupted from the fluffy barrier that stood between her and what was left of the demon king. The light dragon had always been so docile, floating around at the edge of Purah’s vision at all times, but not now. Now, she was a great divine guardian sent to protect the one thing she refused to lose again.

It was then that she knew for certain that there was still a little bit of Zelda in there, even after thousands of years in a form that destroyed all sense of who she was, she was still alive, fighting. Returning when Link needed her most. Catching them as they tumbled from the mouth of the demon who released him only to let out another terrifying roar.

There were a few moments when the battling serpents were still low enough to see, though they had passed the limits of Purah’s telescope, why couldn’t they have the epic fight a little closer? It felt like such a wasted opportunity, she had to remind herself that her friends were up there fighting for their lives, this wasn’t some form of entertainment meant to amuse the royal court. However, she still thought it would be useful for future generations if the moments were documented in some capacity.

Her friends… it hadn’t been just Link and Zelda who had gone to confront the demon king. Link may have gotten an expedited exit with the dark dragon but that meant that the Sages were still stuck down there. Any one of them could be injured or dying with no way to get back up to the surface, and just because she wasn’t in the front lines herself, didn’t mean she wouldn’t be of use.

“Alright! No more slacking off! We need a rescue team headed down that hole pronto!” Purah shoved herself away from her scope and hollered down to the crowd below her. She had to remind herself that she was the leader of this outpost and she couldn’t just laze around. She blew a shrill two-toned alarm from her recorder, part of a communication code she had developed for the lookout landing project. She didn’t carry that thing around everywhere to play a jaunty little tune whenever she felt like it.

“Let’s go people! Half of this kingdom's leaders are down there and they’re counting on us to get them out!” She slid down each ladder leading up to her tower, not bothering to use the steps. Her heels slammed against the wooden floor and she immediately sprung into action, untying the balloons they took to traverse the depths and most importantly, get out of them. She also had to make sure Josha did not sneak onto one of them, because even though it was highly likely that Link cleared out all the monsters in the way of Ganondorf’s little hidey-hole, there were still sure to be oceans of gloom in the way. It wasn’t exactly the peak environment for a child, even if she was a prodigy.

Buliara was the first to join the search team, she wasn’t shy about being protective of the young gerudo chief. A handful of warriors of all races followed her without question, one of Purah’s scientific colleagues got to work preparing the balloon for flight and everyone seemed to understand the gravity of the situation.

Purah’s gaze kept being drawn towards the sky, though she couldn’t see the dragons anymore. Even the smaller spyglass she snatched from Muzu did little to help. She just had to hope that Link hadn’t dropped the master sword or anything.

The rescue team departed in record time and as many precautions as she could spare were available. A group of Rito were sent to keep an eye on the dragon battle at a safe distance, though even they couldn’t fly that high. She had made sure that there were medics ready for anyone to arrive in critical condition, they prepared medicines out of sundelions and the strongest healing elixirs they had the ability to make.

Time seemed to resume the moment she found work to do, while she was ultimately still just waiting for the battle to be over, this time she was running around making sure that everyone knew the plan for the worst-case scenario. Which was to get into the emergency shelter as fast as possible, or really any safe little corner.

That plan nearly came into play when the sky turned a vibrant gorey red. The air around them became heavy with gloom like when the blood moon reached its peak. It burned her eyes but she knew that rubbing them would make the sensation worse, not everyone had that same foresight.

“Baracade the entrances! We don’t want any monsters paying us a visit!” Purah ordered after a short urgent melody on her whistle. She ran to the eastern wall before she pulled out the little telescope.

The dark dragon seemed agitated but she still couldn’t determine if this sudden atmospheric change was a good thing or a bad thing. She hoped it was the demon serpent putting everything into its final attack before plummeting to the ground. She wondered if she could get some samples of the scales it would leave behind or if she would have the rare opportunity to find out what dragon meat tasted like.

Of course, it could also be the demon king rallying his monstrous forces upon the land he promised to rule in eternal darkness, but that wasn’t a very fun option. She didn’t like it nearly as much as the first one.

A speck of golden light caught her eye, a flash of yellow among the sea of smoldering scarlet. It seemed to originate from the great beast's head, or at least she was pretty sure it was his head, if the gnarled thorns that surrounded the sight were his horns.

At first, it had started out as a brief flash, but it quickly grew into a bright star. The serpent seemed to writhe while the glow overtook its entire face. Purah would swear that she saw the shadow of a humanoid figure, thrusting their mighty sword into its forehead. But it could’ve been her imagination or her hope for some epic conclusion convincing her that any tiny difference in colors was something consequential.

The distant dot disappeared into the sky, the light dragon swooping in where it potentially could’ve landed. The dark dragon fled straight up into the clouds, no longer caring about its fated foes, who kept their distance from it.

Beams of white light broke free from the beast's long body, like it was being struck by a hundred sequential arrows. It seemed to let out one last scream before it erupted in a bright blast. Purah was sure she wasn’t the only one who was forced to cover her eyes when it happened.

It was only as the bloody sky began to fade into a soft rosy pink that they were hit with the impact of the explosion. She was barely able to grab a nearby pillar to keep herself from hitting the ground from the shockwave. The ray of beautiful light only shrank in size, never getting any dimmer until it was just suddenly gone.

Purah raised her telescope to the sky once more to search for the surviving dragon and her passenger. She ignored the triumphant cheers from all around her, relieved laughter, and the many who were nearly, or completely, brought to tears. But she didn’t join in. Not yet.

The other dragon, Zelda, the princess was just… gone. There were no clouds to hide behind, though it seemed hard for a creature that size to even be able to hide. In the midst of the light show that was the decimation of the demon king, her friends had disappeared. She had gotten them far enough away from the blast… right?

Everyone was too busy celebrating to notice how the leader of their little settlement wove between them to get back to her tower, maybe if she was higher, she’d be able to see something, anything proving that the light dragon and her rider had not been vaporized. Her ears rang, from the explosion or from the shock of her friend's second disappearance, she couldn’t quite pinpoint.

Purah was deaf to the joy of the people around her as she searched the skies over and over and over again. There had to be something she was missing, a dragon couldn’t just… vanish into nothingness. She just witnessed what it took for one to be destroyed and it was not a quiet affair. So… where could Zelda have gone?

Thankfully, she wouldn’t have to wait longer than a few minutes to get her answer, though it didn’t turn out to be the one she had been expecting. She had continued to scour the clouds, almost mistaking some distant floating island for the dark talons of the light dragon.

“Director Purah,” A voice broke her concentration and suddenly her view through the telescope lens was a fuzzy dark gray. She pulled away from her scouting in mild annoyance until she saw who was speaking to her.

“Get crowing Harth, I hope you have some good news for me, other than that we survived another almost-pocalyspe.” She delicately shortened the spyglass before folding her arms as authoritatively as she could.

“Something was seen falling into the lake to the east, right under the battle. No other debris has been spotted and we have reason to believe that it was Link.” The black rito informed her with a curt nod. Perhaps she would’ve noticed a splash if she hadn’t been so focused on the sky, she nearly cursed herself for it.

“I need you to take me there, we have no idea what condition they’re in,” She tried not to make it sound like an order, the worry in her voice seemingly helped with that. Harth landed on her lookout tower and knelt down before her wordlessly. She wasted no time climbing onto his back and with a quick flap of his mighty wings, they were in the air.

With a rapid set of subsequent snaps, her telescope was back into its extended form and scanning the green hills that surrounded the nearest lake. A couple of tiny monster camps here, some ruins there, but it was a white figure that caught her eye.

At first, Purah thought it was some sort of deity, there was an inhumanness about it. She was decorated in colors that shimmered in every shift of the light and seemed to glow golden and vivid blue at the same time, like a yellow sunset through Lurelin's clear waters. As they grew closer and the image became more clear, she was able to see the truth.

It was Zelda. Bare as the day she was born, her nakedness was only covered by the hero she had cradled in her arms, who also seemed to have slightly more skin showing than usual. Thought she was sure that Link wasn’t unfamiliar with walking right up to their princess in reasonably revealing clothing. She was sure that if her grand-niece were here, she would be blushing hard enough to pass out.

More concerning than the princess's odd new appearance, Link was obviously not doing well. Their arm was barely recognizable, stiffly tucked into their chest, its coloring dark and ashy like they had dipped it into lava, or something worse. Their head was resting on Zelda’s collarbone and even from high in the sky Purah could tell that they were completely unconscious. They were so unnaturally still and pale in the princess’s arms that she immediately began to fear for the worst.

Purah lept to the ground several seconds before they had even landed. She nearly stumbled over her own shoes in the grass in her frantic sprint to get to her friends. She knew the moment Zelda spotted her, the godly stoic demeanor she wore faded into something far more human. She was afraid, her eyes were wide as she jogged to Purah, she looked to be on the very edge of bursting into tears.

“I don’t know what happened, they just… collapsed-” The princess's panicked words stumbled from her mouth breathlessly.

“We have medics on standby at Lookout Landing, all we have to do is get them there,” Purah promised, “We’re so close, you’ll see once we get up the hill.” The scientist wrapped her arm around her friend’s back, between spikes along her spine that she was just noticing. She hoped that the gesture came off as comforting and steadying in the midst of the intense emotions that the princess had to be feeling, Purah knew her abrasive personality could come off as offputting, she could never really tell how much was too much. Though Zelda had leaned into her supportive half-hug so perhaps there was no reason to overthink it.

“I can’t- goddess it’s happening again isn’t it…” Zelda whimpered as Purah led them away from the pond.

“We aren’t going to lose them, this is different.” She replied firmly, “We’re prepared, help is only a few minutes of speedwalking away.”

She turned to Harth, who had a dark wing politely covering his eyes.

“Hey feathers, I need you to make sure they’re ready for an urgent arrival. I don’t know how safe it would be for you to fly them ahead of us, now I’m not a medical doctor but I have a pretty good understanding of hylian physiology and I’m almost certain it would be a bad idea to jostle our beloved hero around while they’re in such a sensitive state.” Purah reasoned, partially to herself as she did have the thought of sending Link earlier than them but decided to put a bit of consideration into it before making a decision like that.

“I’ll see to it.” The Rito didn’t hesitate to take off back into the sky, the flaps of his wings seemed a lot more rapid on his return trip.

“I was wondering what that zonai arm was hiding…” Purah muttered as they made their way towards the settlement. At a closer glance at Link’s arm, it was easy to see why it had to be ‘replaced’ in the first place. The burns were deep and dark and outlined in an unnaturally vivid scarlet. She had the feeling that if she touched it, what was left of the skin would either flake off like pieces of used-up firewood, or it would feel like cold solid stone. The sight worried her greatly, Would there be anything they could do to fix it? Had it been a lost cause from the very beginning?

“Zonai arm?” Zelda asked, with each step, she seemed to be more steady on her feet, and more able to walk at a swifter pace.

“Yeah, they said some ghost gave it to them, something about how theirs was too damaged to be healed. I couldn’t really tell if it was like some kind of glowing magic prosthetic or nifty bandaid, just covering up what was wrong without being able to do much about it.” They had managed a few dozen rapid steps more before Purah drew her arm back to check Link’s pulse. There was still a bit of color to their skin but it was hard to see if they were even breathing on top of the movements created from their purposeful jog. Their speed slowed just for the moment it took for her fingers to meet the hero's throat.

Purah let out a relieved sigh, it wasn’t strong, it wasn’t even at a steady pace, but it was there. Immediately noticeable and persistent in continuing to beat. She only needed to give Zelda a quick nod before they were back to rushing through Hyrule Field.

The eastern gates of Lookout Landing opened as they approached, a couple of knights in training carried a stretcher between them, meeting the trio halfway. Zelda clearly didn’t want to let Link go, her iridescent claws nearly dug into their skin before she accepted that she had to release them from her grasp.

Purah’s long outer robe found its way around the princess's shoulders while she stood frozen in place outside of the settlement's walls. The coat’s owner pulled it carefully around her body, where usually it was balanced on the edge of her shoulders, It was wrapped more snuggly around the princess, for the sake of modesty. With the way Zelda’s cheeks turned pink, Purah made the educated guess that she had only just now realized the state her body was brought back in.

The medical team rushed to the fallen hero’s side before they had even been carried through the gate. The most qualified doctor they had on-site, and realistically one of the best in Hyrule, instantly went to examine Link’s charred arm. She was a gerudo physician with extensive experience in battlefield injuries and had been overseeing the effects of gloom-infected wounds. She knew better than anyone how to deal with the stuff and she didn’t look terribly hopeful when she lifted the hero’s alarmingly stiff arm.

“Come on, let’s give them a moment to sort everything out, and get you into something more comfortable,” Purah led the princess toward her own dwelling, she seemed reluctant to leave Link but there was a reason a patient's relatives were usually not allowed in the surgery room. The scientist pulled out the tablet she named after herself and trusted it to the princess's trembling fingers.

“I can guarantee that they have a better assortment of clothes than I do, I know that there’s at least a backless dress in there that could work with your spine spikes, last I checked it was dyed a real pretty purple,” Purah filled the silence as she entered her quarters. It was still covered in loose papers, though even if it had been perfectly tidy at the beginning of the day, it still would’ve ended up a mess after the recent earthquakes that had nothing to do with shifting tectonic plates. Neither of them even attempted to step around the chaos, messing up piles of papers just didn’t seem very much of a worry at the moment.

Instead of her quite logical suggestion, Zelda chose the outfit Link first appeared from the sky in, a tunic made of loosely wrapped cloth in a rather ancient style. With a little bit of readjustment, it seemed to work just fine for the returned princess. She still looked like some kind of timeless god of the wild but now she was a little less focused on hiding her skin.

Purah was untangling Zelda’s hair from her horns when one of the medics knocked on her door, she hoped that because they didn’t barge in frantically, Link was likely not dying or something. Or perhaps she was just being too hopeful.

“Princess? Director Purah?” The voice was muffled by the solid wooden door. Zelda sprung up instantly, nearly sending her friend flying.

“Yes, yes, come in, tell us everything!” Purah whipped open the door and motioned for the young man to enter, though she couldn’t recall his name she remembered that he had become determined to become a doctor after one of his parents succumbed to gloom sickness before anyone even knew much about it.

“Good news, their vitals are stable and we were able to stop the infection from spreading, at least, temporarily. Bad news… the damage sustained to their arm was too severe, Dr, Nanoa said that the best thing to do is amputate. Even the greatest Zora healer wouldn’t be able to revive a dead limb.” He explained quickly, sensing the urgency of his message.

“That gives me an idea! They have healers at the domain, how long are you guys able to keep him stable?” Purah glanced at the large map hanging behind her.

“Not long enough for a road trip…” the medics assistant muttered.

“The Purah Pad can transport multiple people at once,” Zelda uttered after being unable to speak since entering the settlement. “I can take Link and the doctor with me, will that leave enough qualified medical staff here?”

“I believe so, they’re definitely our top priority right now,” With Purah's acceptance, Zelda was renewed with a new wave of determination. Her back straightened and no one could stop her from heading out the door.

The Director wanted to go with her friend, of course she did, but she was the leader of Lookout Landing, and just like Link and Zelda’s battle hadn’t ended with Ganondorf’s defeat, neither did hers. The sages were still being recovered from the depths, and Purah was determined to meet them the moment they arrived at the surface. She knew she could trust Link’s life in Zelda’s hands, they were safe and accounted for, but she needed to focus on the Hyrulians who weren’t.

Yet.

***

The skies glowed a serene soft champagne yellow, the air carried a chill like she was at the top of a grand mountain, but the long golden grasses around her seemed to generate their own gentle warmth. She couldn’t help but want to sink into the rippling strands and bask in the quiet melancholy that this world seemed to be filled with.

“Link?” The princess called out into the lonely field, they should be here somewhere, this was their dream after all.

Getting to this point had been a blur, she had used the Purah Pad to transport the unconscious hero and the Gerudo doctor to the shrine beneath Zora’s domain and had ignored the reaction to floating to the main structure of the Zora city without a passing glance to the ladders that seemed far less convenient.

With Link cradled in her arms and a set destination in mind, she made her way to the infirmary, Nanoa scrambling behind, she didn’t have the luxury of taking a shortcut directly through the air. Her vision swam with fuzzy splotches of blue as she refused to even perceive the civilization around her. Most of the people in her way managed to dodge her firm path, but she did end up bumping into a few less fortunate Zora.

She could barely hear Lady (Queen?) Yona’s worried voice over her own slightly distracting internal screaming. Thankfully by that point, Nanoa had caught up and willingly explained the situation to the domain's lead healer. Since the moment she arrived, Zelda was a single solitary stone in a stream of moving parts that she could barely keep up with. The only thing that stood still with her was the unconscious swordsman in her arms, their grievously injured arm bandaged in warm yellow salves and sundelion petals laid in a way that mirrored her own scales.

At some point, they were swept up in the storm and she found herself laying her protector's limp form on a stone bed and standing near their head. She vaguely registered that the healers worried that Link would wake during the procedure, as they weren’t awake to be given an oral anesthetic.

Zelda didn’t know how she knew how to do it, just like she didn’t realize she could float above the ground when she just followed instinct to get Link where they had to be. Without much thought, she placed her pointer and middle fingers on the hero's temples. She was well acquainted with projecting her voice and her memories into their mind, there was a door that she sent things through, but never thought to enter herself.

Somehow she knew that with her unexplored connection to their mind, she could keep them asleep for as long as they needed it.

Now she woke up in a heavenly pastel world that failed to resemble a single place she had ever been, though somehow, it still felt oddly familiar

She was about to call out their name once more when she noticed a discrepancy in the long grasses. A slight smudge of darkness as if something had bent the stalks to hide there. She wove through the soft grass until she found what she was looking for.

“So that’s what Purah was talking about when she said Zonai arm…” Zelda sat next to the dazed figure mostly hidden by the lush golden meadow. They didn’t look fully awake, they were making the face they usually made when their princess woke them up too early on a day she was teaching and they just wanted to sleep until noon. Their eyes were a little unfocused and took a moment to really see her.

She took their strange hand in hers and immediately recognized it as Rauru’s. The deep gray flesh beneath the strange metal and turquoise ornamentation was soft like velvet or the dense short fur of some kind of semi-aquatic mammal. The fur thinned out near the palm of their hand and the underside of their fingers, leaving coal-black callused skin and long dark nails that grew to a point.

“Are you real? Is this a dream?” Link rested their head on her shoulder, reluctant to escape from their state of semi-consciousness.

“Both can be true, I’m here to keep you company for a little while,” She was reluctant to fully divulge their condition, she knew she would have to warn them before they woke up from the surgery but no version of her bringing it up seemed tactful enough. How does one tell someone that their dominant limb had to be cut off? How does one tell a swordsman that they would never be able to wield a sword comfortably again?

“That bad?” the hero asked, Zelda did her best to not react, both to Link’s acceptance of their fate and the stinging smell of medical alcohol reaching her nose from the waking world.

“Yeah… our first encounter with the demon king had some… long-term effects. We-we had to… to make a difficult call to… um-” Her voice stuttered and if she had been more than an extension of her consciousness projected into her knight’s mind she would be sweating right through the clothes she had borrowed from them.

“It can’t be saved… can it,” Link moved their borrowed arm, flexing their fingers and squeezing her hand while they still could. By then, the metallic smell of blood had started to seep through into the dream, pungent and inescapable. Thankfully her protector didn’t seem to notice, but they did have a particularly well-practiced poker face.

“No… it can’t,” Zelda sighed, “Even if we could reverse the damage caused by the pure gloom, your body has already stopped providing blood to the area and shut off all the nerve endings. Two-thirds of the arm is already dead, you’d just be carrying around a zombie limb which carries its own set of dangers from my understanding.”

“I-I get it,” They muttered, “When I first woke up in the sky, Rauru told me my arm was too damaged to be saved, so I’ve thought about what would happen once he took his arm back, if there would be anything left of it.”

“I’m sorry. if it makes you feel better, I can work with Purah and Robbie to make you a prosthetic, I think they were experimenting with incorporating sheikah technology into Hyrulian-controlled automaton, obviously, we’re hesitant to make them fully independent…”

“I’ll think about it, it feels like a bit of a waste to spend our first conversation since we lost each other on my stupid arm though,” Link’s voice came out weary, like they were falling asleep. Zelda remembered that their consciousness could only exist in one place at a time, and if they fell asleep now, they would wake up in the Zora’s Domain in the middle of getting their arm cut off. Which was not good.

“I wanted to get it out of the way, it seemed a little important,” She knocked their head off of her shoulder as she began to stand. Without letting their hand go, she rose from the pale golden grasses. They didn’t seem too enthused to be involuntarily pulled to their feet, their vivid blue eyes wandered lazily across the bright landscape but ultimately lingered on her.

“Do you recognize this place?” the hero prompted, it sounded too hopeful to be just a simple question.

“I’m not sure, it feels like I’ve been here before but only in a dream. It’s so peaceful,” Zelda replied after breathing in the crisp mountain air.

“I came up here a lot once I figured out what happened to you,” Link admitted, “Every time I saw the light dragon floating in the sky, I couldn’t help but find the most efficient way to launch myself up to visit,” Zelda’s eyes widened as the unusualness of the world around her began to make sense.

The long soft tufts of grasses weren’t foliage at all, but thick blond hair that floated through the wind without the burden of gravity. Though it had no physical effect, she could still detect the lightness of the air, higher than any floating island she had visited before swallowing that cursed stone. Even the thin atmosphere carried a profound quiet sorrow. She couldn’t tell which one of them the feeling had originated from.

“I missed you too, that’s why I did it you know… any price was worth paying to get back to you.” She smiled.

“Even if there was no guarantee you’d ever be yourself again?”

“I’ll always be myself, the state of self is always prone to change. Even if that change comes in the form of an eternally living dragon who can’t speak and whose consciousness is debatable. I don’t think I was ever really lost, just… asleep.” Zelda swung Link's hand in hers, like they were taking a casual walk through a flowering meadow or strolling through the autumnal forests of Akkala.

Link seemed to have other plans however, they pulled her into their arms a little frantically, and though it wasn’t the first time they had embraced since her return from the mindless dragon form, it was the first where they were both awake for it. Perhaps she should’ve started their real reunion with something like this…

The dense ball of mind-numbing fear that had made a home in her chest ever since the hero went limp in her arms was finally beginning to lose its grip. She had done her best to ignore how much agony she had been in, it was no use paying any attention to it while Link was dying and her world was falling apart. But now they were in her arms, in a glowing sky that was proof that they were still alive.

“We’re going to be okay,” Zelda vowed through a whisper in Link’s ear after a moment of silence that could’ve lasted anywhere between a few minutes to a few eons.

Time passed and they refused to let each other go. As the air around them seemed to turn red with the smell of blood which eventually thinned out and stopped altogether. It didn’t matter how long it took, she never got tired of hugging him. She should’ve gotten bored of the stillness and the lack of conversation but it was perfect just knowing that they were there, that the worst was likely over. The silence that should drive her insane by now was surprisingly more of a comfort than she had expected.

It was tranquility, there was still a long road ahead, one that wouldn’t be easy and Zelda was surprised to have so willingly accepted that. Even if she had a choice in the matter. In swallowing that stone, she had prepared for an ending, but it was nothing of the sort. Life continued on, and it would always bring new challenges.

It scared her, that everything was so prone to dramatic change, but she knew that she was never alone for it. She would always have Link as an anchor, a goal to rush toward in crashing tides, to hold her in the dark nights when her memories taunted her like vengeful ghosts. The world would go on and even if they were apart, she was never left alone. Maybe that was why it was so easy to make peace with it.

Eventually, they would return to the world outside of Link's mind, they would see what remained of their arm. As much of it that could be saved, was. Nearly black gloom-scarred skin surrounded the newer incision, though enough Zora healing power had been poured into it that there wasn’t much left behind other than a thin line.

Link would want to go home, but that wouldn’t be wise, and they would be too weak to fight the unamused glares of two queens and one Gerudo warrior. Their friends would arrive after hearing about the hero's condition, even though they sported their own wounds. Save for Mineru, who was still a robot and couldn’t really bleed. She would refuse repairs, as there would be no need to have a working body with her purpose finally complete.

After several slow days of recovery, the sages would make one last journey together. The final Zonai that remained in the land of the living would leave behind one last gift. A final piece of her people, into the outstretched hand of the hero. The sage of spirit would live on, and with the fall of the old kingdom, a new one was destined to rise, just as it has many times before.

Finally then, it would be time for them to go home, a swordsman unable to wield a sword like they used to and a Hylian queen who could barely be considered hylian anymore. To the mushroom and fashion-obsessed village, across a natural bridge, to the cottage they shared at the edge of civilization. Everything was just how they left it.

Their lives didn’t end with the calamity, or when Link’s life literally temporarily ended, they didn’t end when Zelda was irrecoverably stuck in the past or when she sacrificed herself to become a dragon with no expectation to return, and they wouldn’t end now.

It hadn’t been an ending or even a new beginning. Life continued on, just like it always did. It would be difficult, and it would be different, but what a pleasure it was to experience it at all.

#totk spoilers #zelink #fanfiction #dragon zelda #tears of the kingdom #amputee loz link #totk #trans link #nonbinary Link #loz #loz fic

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