Chapter Text
"Now, my moment has finally come. Brace yourself, Ganon, for the sting of my revenge!"
"This will be our final opportunity. We will not fail!"
"Let's go, little guy! Now! Open up wide, Ganon!"
"A hundred years in the making... Hold on, Princess. Our moment has arrived!"
Vah Medoh fires first, naturally, unleashing a beam of brilliant blue light the likes of which Hyrule hasn't seen for over ten thousand years. The other Divine Beasts follow, so rapid in succession that an untrained eye might think that they fire all at once.
Revali's eyes are not untrained, thank you very much. Mipha fired second, followed closely by Daruk and Urbosa, and while he cannot see the fight—none of them can—he feels the Calamity recoil, somewhere deep in the depths of Hyrule Castle.
"That's that, then," Urbosa says through her Divine Beast.
He can't quite make out the small plateau where Vah Naboris is stationed now, not with the dust firing her laser had kicked up—but he can picture Urbosa crossing her arms, and leaning back against a pillar, quite clearly. What he can't picture is her dead, he can't picture any of them dead, but...
Well, they are, aren't they? They all are.
"How is he doing?" Revali asks, laying a spectral wing upon his own Divine Beast.
"Ganon?" says Mipha. "Or Link?"
"Both. Either." He shrugs, before remembering that none of the others can see him, no more than he can see them. "Naturally, I utilized all the reserves of power Vah Medoh still had, in my assault. I'd assume that the rest of you did the same. We must have done some damage."
(And maybe it's selfish of him to even wonder, but with a combined attack from the four of them, their long-dead hearts beating as one—could they have killed Ganon? Was the sword that sealed the darkness, and its hero, even necessary at all?)
"We did a lotta damage," Daruk reports. "But he’s still up and fighting. Link's using my Protection a lot."
Groans, from both Urbosa and Mipha. And then a sharp intake of breath from the latter.
"He just needed my Grace," Mipha says softly.
"And my Fury." Urbosa laughs vindictively. She snaps her fingers, the sound audible even over the connection. "If I had to guess... another hit like ours, and we'd be doing Link’s job for him!"
"It's a shame, then, that our attack took everything we had," Revali mutters under his breath. Judging by the gasp from Mipha, he didn't mutter it quietly enough, and he hastily adds, "Though I have nothing but faith in Link, to finish what we began."
"If you did not have faith in him by now, there would have to be something wrong with you," Mipha says, her words just barely shy of a threat.
"I do."
(And oddly enough, he means it. The Link that had woken up a century after all their deaths is... different, in many ways, from the Link that Revali had a sometimes-less-than-friendly rivalry with. He's less reserved, more... chaotic. He smiles more.)
(Revali would have liked to get to know him better, were he still alive to do it.)
"If the two of you are quite finished," Urbosa says in a tone that brokers no argument, "Link has just called upon my Fury a second time. A third is all the aid I can give him, from such a great distance."
"I cannot heal him again," Mipha says unhappily. "I can only hope that he will not need it."
"He's bein' pretty careful, which I would say isn't like him... except that he is going up against Ganon here. He's had my Protection active for mostly the entire fight. Only actually used it once, though—and I think I've got enough strength left in me for a couple more hits."
Revali can practically feel the old Goron beaming as he continues, "What about you, Revali?"
"He..." Revali sighs. He looks away, even though there really isn't anything to look away from. "He borrowed my Gale once, while fighting a Lynel on his way into the castle. And a second time, to avoid being blasted into bloody Link-shaped pieces by a Guardian."
Daruk gets it first. "Just one more time, huh?"
"Yes."
"And he hasn't used it yet in the fight proper?"
"...Yes."
"If it is any consolation to you," Urbosa offers, "the glimpses I have seen of the chamber where he is fighting that monster seem to indicate that it is a rather enclosed space."
"It isn't," Revali says tightly, "but I thank you regardless."
There is a long pause from Urbosa. "...Fury again. Ganon is looking noticeably wounded, I think, though I don't exactly have a healer's eye to know for sure."
"What little I saw of Ganon confirmed our... or I suppose, Zelda's suspicions... that the Calamity was unlike anything we had ever seen in our lifetimes before," Mipha remarks. "A healer's eye would do you little good."
"Fair enough." Urbosa pauses once more, though not this time because Link is calling upon her spirit for aid, and for a shorter time than before. "It did look like it was bleeding. If we assume Malice counts as its blood."
Revali could not suppress the shudder that runs through his body at that if he tried. "I would rather not assume that, actually!"
"It does explain a lot about Ganon, though, does it not?" Mipha says thoughtfully.
"Could we talk about this later, by any chance?"
"Revali," Urbosa says, "none of us will be here later."
"Exactly. That is disgusting, I do not want to think about it, never mind talk about it, and I am quite certain that Daruk would agree with me. Right, Daruk?"
Daruk, for once in his life, is notably silent. Tellingly silent, until he isn't. "Protection's down."
"Your Protection is what?" Revali squawks. "Already? You said that you could protect him—"
"Twice more." It almost sounds like Daruk is breathing heavily. "That thing is smart. It tried to skewer him from one direction and blow his head off from another. That cheatin' little..."
"Calamity Ganon? Little?" Revali remarks, because sarcasm is how he coped in life and he certainly isn't going to waste time finding better coping mechanisms now that he's dead.
"Good point," Daruk mumbles. "Link's not exactly fresh in the fight. But he's still alive. And he's close to takin' it out, I can feel it in my bones."
"Close won't mean anything if he..." Revali shakes his head to himself. Calling upon his Gale, he soars upward, above Medoh, and he calls out towards the castle, "What are you waiting for?!"
He can see the castle better, from higher up.
Consequently, he has a better view than he would have otherwise of the massive stone structure collapsing in upon itself.
"No!" Daruk shouts—evidently he isn't far enough away from Medoh to not be able to hear the others.
"Link! Zelda!" Mipha screams.
"Oh no," Urbosa whispers, quietly enough that Revali doesn't think he'd hear it if he were standing right next to her. And yet, it's conveyed across their connection all the same.
"You," Revali shrieks across Hyrule, "had better not be—"
In an instant, he's elsewhere. He's rising with his Gale once more, but instead of Vah Medoh and Rito Village below him, it's the ruins of the very castle he just watched collapse. The dust hasn't settled yet, but shooting up from it, carried on the winds of the magic Revali calls his own, is Link. Hanging from his paraglider, tunic and armor scorched in a few places, and his eyes find Revali in an instant.
"So you finally deigned to call upon me, too," Revali says, gliding up around him. He can already feel Medoh tugging him back, but he resists that pull, if only to linger here for just a few moments longer. "Where is the Princess? What happened to Ganon?"
He realizes, slightly too late, that with Link's hands full of paraglider, he's somewhat limited to yes-or-no answers. Still, Link shrugs—presumably to Revali's first question—and then takes a hand off the paraglider to point.
"That is unsafe and you know it, you use that with two hands or not at all," Revali squawks indignantly, already following Link's gaze out into the field, where... oh.
Oh, no.
That's Malice converging there, Malice coalescing into a form that almost looks like a massive angry boar. It roars, just as he is twisting in midair to look at Link again—and Revali is back aboard Vah Medoh.
"No, no, no!" Revali all but snarls. "Not now—"
"Revali! What is happening?" Mipha more demands than asks.
"Link is alive. For now." Revali paces back and forth upon Medoh's deck, longing for the feel of it beneath his feet or the ever-present click-clack of talons upon stone. "I do not believe he has any idea where Zelda is, but it appears that Ganon is not yet finished."
"What?!" Daruk hollers.
"That cannot be," Urbosa mutters, though she sounds dubious of her own words. "Whatever new trickery this is, Link will overcome it."
"He must," Mipha whispers. "He simply has to!"
"...He can't possibly take on that alone," Revali says.
The return to Vah Medoh had, rather rudely, yanked him out of the sky and set him right back down upon his Divine Beast. But his Gale is his, and he no longer lacks the physical limitations that kept him from overusing it in life, and so Revali shoots upwards a second time, straining to see something of what is happening, to make out anything at all.
He can make out Ganon, or the porcine monster that appears to be its final form.
And he can barely, just barely, make out what might be Link on a horse.
(Where did he... it doesn't matter.)
"...Revali?" Urbosa says warily. "What are you doing?”
It is then, precisely then, that Revali makes a decision. It is the sort of decision that others will later describe as 'remarkably foolish' and 'incredibly stupid,' among other things, and he is well aware of this fact. He does not, however, particularly care what others will think of him when he himself will be nothing but a memory far too soon.
"I am doing nothing more than my duty as a Champion, as the pilot of Vah Medoh, and as Revali of the Rito." He pauses, hesitates, and then adds, "It was... an honor to fight alongside you. All of you. Thank you.”
He spreads his wings, translucent blue memories that he can no longer feel the wind with, and he flies. Not upward, like before, but outward. Towards the center of Hyrule, where the duel for the fate of everyone still alive rages on.
He blocks out the yelling from the others. He can't afford distractions right now. And, at any rate, once he has passed a certain distance away from Vah Medoh, there's an uncomfortable twinge in his gut, and he can no longer hear them at all.
He isn't bothered by once again being alone. Why would he be? He pushes that down alongside everything else he's suppressing—soon, very soon, it won't matter anyway—and pushes himself even harder, even faster.
(On the plains surrounding what used to be Hyrule Castle, a knight with almost no memory of being a knight spurs his horse closer, the Bow of Light clasped tightly in his hands. He aims, and fires, and hits—time after time after time—until the beast collapses. A brilliant golden light emerges from it, coalescing into a woman in a tattered white dress: Zelda. She holds up her hand, the back glowing with a symbol he knows instinctively is the Triforce, and that same golden light erupts outwards in a wave.)
(That wave disintegrates Ganon into nothing but free-floating Malice, drifting aimlessly in the air, and continues outward at an ever-increasing pace. Zelda remains standing there, her hand held up, until that wave has long since passed beyond where Link can see. Then, and only then, does she lower her hand, shoulders sagging with visible exhaustion, and turn to face him.)
("May I ask... Do you really remember me?")
Revali is still too far away—much, much too far away—to see what is happening. One moment, it looks like Link may be making some headway against the dark beast Ganon had become. The next, there is light, coming toward him, much too fast to avoid.
"What the—" He dives for the trees below him.
But again, he is not fast enough. The light connects with him, and the spirit of Champion Revali vanishes without a trace.
The wave of light passes further, passes outward, and disappears at the borders of Hyrule, its work done.
Seconds later, a Rito with dark blue feathers appears, or maybe reappears, precisely where Revali's spirit had vanished. He certainly does bear a striking resemblance to Revali, or would to anyone who happens to know what the Champion Revali looked like.
He is also, currently, both unconscious and nearly fifty feet above the ground.
Revali falls, completely unaware of it.
He's lucky enough that a tree breaks his fall. But that is as far as his luck goes. One of his wings hits a branch with a sharp crack. His scarf catches in the leaves, tearing itself free. And, worst of all, his head collides with the trunk at a speed that, had he not already been unconscious, certainly would have rendered him so.
And so the Champion Revali, pride of the Rito, crumples to the forest floor in a feathery heap—alive, but only just.
As it just so happens, Link does remember Zelda. Not well, nowhere near as much as she likely hopes he does—but he does remember some things. He remembers accompanying her all over Hyrule, both when she was still rather frosty towards him and once they had actually become friends. He remembers bits and pieces—horses, frogs… Guardians.
It'll have to be enough. And even if it isn't, Link still has a job to do. This one is just self-imposed.
The first thing he does, once he's certain that Ganon is in fact dead—or if not dead dead, then at least not coming back for another ten thousand years—is hug her. Her eyes widen, before she chokes back a sob and hugs him back, like he'll disappear if she lets go.
(He gets it, he really does. He's probably hugging her exactly the same way.)
"I-I'm so sorry, Link," she whispers, her words shaky. "I don't have any idea of where we can go from here. Or if you'll even want anything to do with me from here..."
He pushes her away, gives her a distinctly unimpressed look, and signs, "Don't be ridiculous. You're all I have left."
Zelda laughs unhappily, shaking her head. "You are all that I have left. I... haven't been able to keep watch over you as much as I would have liked to, but I know you've made lots of friends in this strange new world. If you wanted to just... walk away, I wouldn't begrudge you it at all."
"That's a lie, I think you would." Link raises an eyebrow, and is rewarded by her muttering something sheepishly under her breath and looking away. "Also, no. I wish I could remember you better, but I don't think I would have—were we friends? Because I feel like we were friends. And if we weren't, we should be after..."
Lacking a colorful enough way to describe Ganon on short notice and when he's still aching everywhere, Link just points over her shoulder. At the space Ganon had occupied. The only trace left of him now is the grass where he'd fallen, discolored in a way that looks suspiciously similar to Malice, but while Zelda looks and presumably sees as much nothing as he does, she does seem to get the point.
"We were friends, of a strange sort, by the end," Zelda says softly. "As much as we could be when babysitting me was your job."
Link shrugs. "It isn't now. Want to be friends?"
Blinking back tears, she nods.
"Great! Glad that's settled. Can we have the rest of this conversation elsewhere? Someone has to have seen us fighting the Calamity. I don't really want to deal with answering questions right now." He holds out a hand to her.
"...Me neither," Zelda admits, and takes it.
He's all but certain that she's still wearing the same dress she was on the night that everything went horribly wrong. He's got several different sets of armor stored in the Sheikah Slate. He considers this, then takes out the nondescript traveler's set. The Slate's even nice enough to set it down in the non-Maliced grass, folded and everything.
He gives her hand a comforting squeeze, then slips his out of hers so he can go back to signing. "I know somewhere we can lay low, at least for a while. Not a lot of overlap between people who know they'll be able to find me there, and people who know I'm that Link. It'll be easier to keep it that way if you change."
Zelda looks down at her dress, and barely holds back a grimace. "I see your point."
Link gives her a thumbs-up, and turns around. He waits, staring off in the direction of nothing in particular, until the sounds of rustling clothes have ceased.
"You can look now. Thank you." Zelda pauses. She's looking down at her new outfit by the time Link's turned back to face her, brow furrowed. "Is... it supposed to be this green?"
"Wasn't originally," Link signs quite cheerfully. "There's a dye shop in Hateno. I like green."
Zelda nods, as he goes to pick up her discarded dress. "Wait, don't—"
Oops. It's already in the Slate. He rehooks it onto his belt and signs, "We can figure out what to do with that later."
She sighs. "Yes, I suppose we can. Might I ask... where are we going?"
"My house. It's in Hateno."
Besides the occasional bit of crying, Zelda has been keeping her composure remarkably well. This changes as she stares at him, apparently in sheer disbelief. "You have a house?"
"You have a house," Zelda repeats to herself, stepping over the threshold behind him. She still doesn't sound like she can believe that fact, though her eyes are darting about the small building like she wants to take in every bit of it.
Link turns, spreads his arms wide, and bows. He walks around her, shutting the door by leaning on it, and signs, "It's not much. But it is home."
There's the table in the center of the main room, with two chairs. More than he generally needs. More than he needs almost all of the time, really.
There's the wall mounts for various weapons—most of them empty, for a very good reason. A bow he'd taken off a Lynel is in its permanent spot where it won't make his arms feel like they're being pulled out of their sockets every time he tries to draw it.
There's his bed up in the loft, and the spare bedroll he keeps spread out under the stairs for the odd visitor.
And, of course, there's the picture on the wall. It figures that the picture is what catches Zelda's eye with a little gasp. She dashes upstairs, far faster than someone who is technically a hundred and seventeen years old should be able to.
"Link! Where did you..." She looks back at him, as he catches up.
"I know a guy," Link signs, because explaining Kass to her is quite solidly not his main priority at the moment. "I'm not sure if he knows that I'm that Link or not and I've known him for long enough that at this point, it would be really awkward to ask."
"But..." Zelda looks baffled. "You got this picture from him? You are in the picture!"
Link shrugs. "To be fair, the rest of the Rito are convinced that I'm my own descendant and absolutely nothing I have tried will convince them otherwise. So he is in good company."
Zelda laughs. And then smacks a hand over her mouth. "Sorry! Sorry, I really shouldn't laugh, but…"
"It is funny," Link points out. "Anyway. You've got as much time as you need to figure things out. Nobody in Hateno knows who I am, and we look enough alike that if anyone asks, you're my sister."
"...Thank you," Zelda says softly. She sits on the bed, her back to the picture of the two of them and all their dead friends. "I'm sorry, truly I am. I... really don't know what to do."
Hesitating briefly, Link takes a seat next to her. "I'll probably keep doing what I've been doing. You're welcome to join me."
Zelda raises an incredulous eyebrow. "By what you have been doing, you mean... what exactly?"
He shrugs. "Helping people. Fighting monsters. I definitely got more sidetracked than I should have on my way to fight Ganon, but I can't regret it, even if I should."
She snorts. "I assume that would be part of why you have a house?"
"Yeah. It is. Though if all the darkness is sealed..." He draws the sword that's been on his back since he entered Hyrule Castle, ready to bring about the end of an era, and lays the flat of the blade across his lap. "I should probably put the darkness-sealing sword back?"
He hadn't exactly meant to sign it as a question, but it sure feels like one. And judging by the quizzical look Zelda is giving him, she seems to think so too.
"Why?" She asks.
Link raises his hands to sign an answer, and promptly lowers them again. He doesn't actually know why.
And, almost as if in response to that question, to his hesitance—something really weird happens. There's a distinct chime, one that resonates with Link somewhere deep in his soul, right before something leaps out of the sword.
That something is something even weirder: a blue person, with a long bicolor cape draped about her shoulders, green-blue wrappings about her legs, and a brilliant blue diamond holding it all together. She stares at him. Link stares back.
Zelda breaks the silence. "What— who—"
"This should not be possible," the blue person states, still staring.
"What should not be possible? Who are you?"
Link realizes, as he raises his hands to sign, that he's seen that diamond somewhere before. He looks down. An identical diamond, if much smaller, is set into the hilt of his sword. It's pulsating gently in a way that he's never seen it do before.
(So is the diamond set into the blue person's chest.)
"You're the Master Sword," he signs, eyes wide.
"I am," she confirms. She curtsies, and Link suddenly realizes that if she has arms at all, they're completely invisible. "Though I know not why it is I have reawakened fully, and why now of all times, it is... good to see you again, Master."
Looking nervously over their shoulder to ensure that they are alone, the Yiga scout takes a deep breath, lets it out, and hits the button to record their words.
"Testing, testing..." They squint at the screen of their Slate. "Good. Um, okay. This is Log... Fifteen, since I started recording them. And this is a really important one, today! With the Calamity vanquished by that hero, nobody... really wants to do much of anything right now. Honestly, I wouldn't either, except that I deal with stress by locking myself into the library for days on end, and I found something really interesting. Something that could change things, even though Ganon is dead, and s-so is Master Kohga..."
They sniffle, and wipe their eyes. They really hope that won't be audible on the recording.
"A-Anyway!" They stutter. "I'm... on the shore of Lake Hylia right now, because I found something. It's not m-much, but it's... something. There's said to be a really, really powerful weapon buried in the lake, from... ages ago! Before the Yiga even split from the Sheikah, before Calamity Ganon was even Calamity Ganon! A weapon that old has to be powerful enough to save the Yiga. It just has to be!"
They gulp, blink hard, and continue, "So, here I am. I'm... not a very good swimmer, comes with the territory of spending the last several years of your life living next to a desert, I guess. But! Remember Log Ten? I managed to replicate the Magnesis runology that our ancestors used. And that the Hero uses with his stupid Sheikah Slate. His version's probably stronger. But my version... I definitely know how to use it better."
Squinting at their own Yiga Slate, they activate their own version of Magnesis, and look around. The world is red, now. Red, except for the sickle at their hip (for emergencies) and, deep within the lake...
"There!" They grin. "Okay, it's a little far away, but I figured it would be metal. Because most legendary weapons are. Most legendary weapons are... swords, actually, and this looks like it could be one! So, now, I just have to... get it..."
Wading out a little into the lake, they squint at the gold maybe-sword and try to reach just a little farther... yes!
"Okay. Um, I've got it with Magnesis! Now comes the easy part." Except it doesn't. Except no matter how hard they tug with Magnesis, they can't make it budge much, or (more annoyingly) rise out of the water to greet them. "...I think it's stuck. Under a rock, or something? It's... kind of hard to tell what's got it stuck, but it doesn't actually look like it's that far down."
They gulp. And, making a decision, they deactivate Magnesis. "Like I said. I'm not the best swimmer. But it doesn't look like there are any Lizalfos around, so I think I'll be okay. I just need to see what's down there, and maybe pull it out enough that I can get the rest of the way without my noodle arms. Anyway, going to call Log Fifteen here, because—w-well, my Yiga Slate is waterproof, but obviously I can't talk underwater. Obviously. If you never hear from me again, I probably drowned. Um, if someone else from the Yiga finds this, I'm sorry, I... tried my best and I'm s-sorry it wasn't good enough. If anyone else finds this? Eat dirt and choke on it. Ending Log Fifteen!”
Hitting the button to stop their recording, they gulp, then shrug off their pack and leave it on the shore.
"Here goes nothing," they whisper to themself before diving into the lake named for the goddess they'd die before following.
Of course, it couldn't be a pleasant lake to dive into. The water is cold, not to the point where they'd be at risk of freezing to death, but—it's not comfortable. They shudder, and swim down to where they'd seen the maybe-sword.
The lake is deeper than they thought it would be. Their head is pounding by the time they get down there. But they're down here, and so they fumble about the rocks...
There!
It's a handle, belonging to that legendary weapon. Metal, like they thought. And so they plant their feet against the rock it's stuck under, wrap both hands around the hilt of the weapon—if they stopped to think about it, they might wonder just how big this weapon was, but they don't—and they pull.
It budges, a tiny bit. Not much, but maybe enough that they can get it the rest of the way with Magnesis, and they can't actually hold their breath for much longer. So they kick off the lake bottom, and swim for the surface.
...Or they would, if their fingers were not suddenly stuck to the sword's handle. Their eyes widen, first in surprise and then fear. They tug harder, but to no avail. They're just not strong enough to tug themself free, or to tug the sword free.
(If they were less panicked, and not very quickly running out of air, they might wonder when they'd become so certain that this weapon is a sword. Or they might notice that the sword's handle feels warm in their grip. But as it just so happens, they are very much panicking, and so they don't.)
"No, no, no!" They scream, or try to, but the words only escape them as soundless, useless bubbles. It was one thing to think that they might screw up and drown. It's another thing entirely to be facing that demise here and now, with absolutely nothing they can do about it.
The last thing they manage to mouth, before their eyes drift shut and their consciousness fades entirely, is a desperate apology.
(The last thing they're aware of is the hilt of that sword going from warm to burning hot.)