Investigation

[zelda_hylia]

Who: Zelda and ALL THE PEOPLE
Where: All over Vatheon, even on the island a bit
When: January 18-23rd, day and night (though not too late at night)
Style: Either
Status: Open!


Maybe you notice the princess staring too long at something, or maybe you notice the Sheikah scaling new heights to investigate those hard to reach places - but Zelda is definitely on the prowl for information now that the faeries are gone. She wisely avoids the ruins of the church, but nowhere else public seems to be beyond her interest. At least she doesn't break into people's houses like the other Hylian here in Vatheon.

Comments

[zelda_hylia]

Hearing Link's voice, Sheik froze. Ah, that was right - it wasn't Link. There was no use in hiding now. He leapt over to the replica's tree like it's what he had intended all along.

"Hello," he said quietly.

[replicatedcourage]

Dark Link swung one foot over the branch so he could look Sheik in the face. Er. Mask.

"You're the guy from the other day, the other person from Hyrule. You didn't tell me your name." The shadow looks to the side, breaking eye contact. "Did... did you hear about the faeries?"

[zelda_hylia]

He looked so dejected. Sheik could hardly stand it. He nodded, settling down nearby.

"I saw. It was cruel. I didn't know they were actually alive until then," he admitted. After considering it for a little while, he continued. "My name is Sheik."

[replicatedcourage]

"Of course they were alive, they were faeries." His voice was chiding, but he only flicked his gaze to Sheik briefly before once again staring at a knot in the branch on which they were perched. "I feel like I was supposed to have done something..."

He licked his lips nervously, trying so very hard not to dwell on that feeling of helplessness like had Ion advised him. "U-um... so, you're Sheik? Are you a Sheikah?"

[zelda_hylia]

The fact that he knew what a Sheikah was helped. It wouldn't seem strange at all for Sheik to know things if Dark Link had an understanding of the Sheikah. Maybe he could use this opportunity to find out more about the replica's mission.

"I am. And you are the one from the Water Temple?" Sheik's tone was casual.

[replicatedcourage]

"'The one'?" He echoed, not sure of Sheik's meaning. As far as he knew he was the only one besides his original. That's probably what he meant. "Ah.. yeah. My master put me there to beat the hero, or stall him, or whatever I could do. I failed, though."

There was a note of relief in his voice, but it was quite well hidden in the overall guilt and upset of his tone.

"I thought my master revived me here to give me another chance, but I'm starting to wonder if that's really true. He's not here... I don't know why I'm here either, then. I think there must be some kind of quest. There's always a quest when you wake up somewhere strange."

[zelda_hylia]

A quest? If he was anything like Link, he'd get himself into a lot of trouble with that attitude. Sheik shook his head.

"There is no quest here. We're being used like batteries, experimented on... we cannot even investigate what's happening too closely. The people here are not as simple in their retribution as Ganondorf. If you displease them, they will hurt others as punishment, not you."

[replicatedcourage]

"W-what?! Why would they do that?!" Say what you will about Ganondorf, but he has always been very direct. If you displease him, then you are the one to pay the price. Clean. Simple. Targeting someone on purpose purely because they have a relationship of some kind with the transgressor? It was unheard of, and plain unfair.

"If I go trying to find a way out, then they could hurt Ion, or Johnny, or Izaya.. o-or even Zelda!" His heart leapt to his throat and he sat straight as a bowstring and twice as tense. "I won't go looking, I won't. I don't want anyone to get hurt because of me!"

[zelda_hylia]

He hadn't meant to scare the poor thing that terribly. Sheik holds a hand out.

"It's fine, calm down. I believe you. I don't want anyone to get hurt either," he replied. He couldn't help but be a little suspicious at Dark Link's list of people he didn't want hurt, though. Izaya? Just what was the informant trying to do here?

"Those people are your friends?"

[replicatedcourage]

"Most of them. Zelda doesn't like me at all." He picked at the bark under his fingers. "I don't understand, since I'm the same as Link, but I hate it when she screams at me so I haven't really talked to her since then to ask why."

He paused for a moment to work out a particularly stubborn piece of tree bark and broke it apart in his hands idly. He didn't want to remember the constricted feeling in his chest he felt whenever he saw Zelda.

"Izaya and Ion live with me, though. They're both really smart and nice and Johnny plays music with me sometimes, he's really good."

[zelda_hylia]

He still felt guilt, seeing him so obviously upset, but it was more distant like this.

"Perhaps she's just afraid of you." He shifted uncomfortably. "You are like Link, but you were created by Ganondorf. She spent half her life running from him, after all."

[replicatedcourage]

"Afraid of me?" It hadn't ever occurred to him. Yes he was created to kill and replace his original and basically hand her and Hyrule to Ganondorf, but...

Well, that would make someone afraid, wouldn't it.

He'd thought he could defeat Ganondorf himself, in the end. Save Hyrule himself, be the hero, get the girl. But heroes don't kill people, heroes don't call evil "master", and heroes don't care about personal glory, only what's right. He wasn't like that. He wanted, he coveted.

He wanted those things because that's what Link had. A destiny, a higher purpose. But if he had to keep trying to get those things, trying to be Link, that just meant he wasn't. The loss of Navi - no, the loss of his silent fairy, she wasn't Navi even if he had thought of her it that way - only served to compound this realization. I'm just a shadow, chasing after the real Link but never catching up... I really am a fake. No wonder she's afraid...

"...Oh." It was all he could manage under the weight of such an epiphany.

[zelda_hylia]

"If she doesn't need to be afraid of you, you should tell her. She... she would want to be friends."

He had no idea what was going through the man's mind, but he could tell that it was bad. He looked utterly lost. This time, Sheik put his outstretched hand on Dark Link's shoulder.

[replicatedcourage]

Dark Link shied away from Sheik's hand, giving him a single, terrified, lost look.

I'm a fake. I don't belong.

Those friends he had made, the ones he wanted to protect, were they really his friends if he wasn't real? Did they only profess to like him because he was like Link and they would have liked him?

I'm a fake...

He swallowed hard and mumbled an apology before dropping from the tree and running back towards the city and the relative safety of his room. It was good he had an innate sense of direction because the tears that welled up prevented him from seeing much in his path.

Fake.

His feet pounded from grass to pavement, as if trying to outrun the word.

[zelda_hylia]

Sheik almost ran after him, but he decided against it in the end. He climbed down from the tree numbly, staring after his quickly retreating form. What was it? What had he done this time?

Why did he keep hurting people without meaning to?