Heroes Between Realms

Link

Everyone coughed at the smoke that filled the small room. Link swatted it away from his eyes, finding Jenkins gone from the center of the room.

    Link surveyed the situation. He knelt down at the spot where Jenkins once was, finding little red pieces of paper with a red Skeikah eye painted on it. Wait, no.

    The Yiga eye.

    The Yiga must have telaported in here and stolen Jenkins away. Maybe that was what that little pause was. Jenkins could have heard them coming, or he could have been bluffing and actually been scared. His smile had faultered, backing this theory up. Neither seemed likely, but Link was living the proof.

    "Where did he go!" Zelda cried from behind him.

    "Yiga hideout," Link answered.

    "What?" everyone in the room seemed to yell. Even Terrako gave an appalled whistle.

    "But. . . Why?" Zelda wondered.

    "Jenkins is our enemy; the Yiga is our enemy," Riju drawled. "The Yiga could be using him as an ally."

    "We must recapture this voe," Buliara said. Link didn't know when she got there, but she said what everyone was thinking.

    Link stepped out of the room and around a corner, changing into the Sheikah armor. He had only taken off the top of the Gerudo clothing when Zelda walked around the corner. She gasped, cheeks red, and hid in the other hall to give Link privacy while he changed.

    "You're not going alone," Zelda stated as fact.

    "I have to," Link retorted, pulling on the pants of the Sheikah armor.

    "I'm coming with you," Zelda argued. "It's dangerous to go alone."

    "That's why you're staying." Link pulled up his hair into the Sheikah bun as he turned the corner to face Zelda. "I've been there before. They are leaderless now, or under new rule. It will be easy to slip through."

    Zelda stared up at him with wide eyes and parted lips. Her chest heaved up and down with ragged, unsteady breaths. Riju came around the bend.

    "Good luck, Link," she said.

    Zelda turned to her with anger in her eyes. "He can't go by himself."

    "He already has," Riju shrugged. "It'll be easy this time around."

    Link turned and climbed the stairs leading out of the ice house. Zelda and Riju followed behind. Link could hear Zelda's short, panicked breaths. This was starting to mirror what happened last night. If Link left her, she would start seeing Jenkins when he wasn't there.

    Link turned to Riju. "Keep her distracted." Then he grabbed a sand-seal and dropped his shield to stand on. He was riding over the dunes before Zelda could protest anymore.

    It pained Link to just leave like that, but hopefully Riju will keep Zelda's mind off him. He pulled the mask over his nose to protect his face from the flying sand, but he couldn't stop his eyes from watering from what he just did.

    Link directed the sand-seal around the bend and through the chasm that led to the Yiga hideout. The farther he went, the more narrow the chasm got and the more frequent the evil frog statues appeared. Soon, he had to walk around the statues, into the secret entrance. Link ducked behind the tapestry hiding the tunnel.

    The only sound heard was his breathing behind the mask. His feet didn't make a noise, thanks to the Sheikah armor. Soon, he came upon the cage a Gerudo woman was once held, but was now empty. That left one more place where Jenkins could be.

    Link waited for his chance to sneak-strike the first Yiga blademaster, then glided past the second one at the bottom of the stairs. He snuck around the bladmasters in the next room to climb a ladder. Then he made his way over the rafters, bypassing all the Yiga swarming the space below.

    Link made his way to the seemingly empty room, and used the magnesis rune to open the metal door leading to the big gaping hole in the ground. Link shut the door behind him, nearly missing what happened.

    The biggest bladmaster Link has ever seen pushed Jenkins over the edge, sending him falling down the endless hole. The the Yiga jumped down afterward.

    Link ran to the edge and peered over. The Yiga disappeared in the shadows far below. Bracing himself, Link took a few steps back, then ran and leaped over the edge.

    He seemed to fall forever, only pulling the paraglider out when he hit the darkness. Moments passed before a small splash sounded beneath him, and Link knew he was nearing the bottom. Soon, he was easing himself onto solid ground.

    Something sticky and wet seeped through the Sheikah shoes, coating Link's feet. The oder was horrendous. It smelled like iron, salt, and rot, making Link gag so much it hurt his throat. He took a flameblade from the Sheikah Slate and illuminated the space around him. Link gasped and nearly dropped the flameblade at what he saw.

    The liquid he was standing in was red, glowing in the light. People were all around him, but they were lying on the ground, still and cold. Their eyes were cloudy, their faces shaped in fear.

    So this is where the Yiga deposit their victims.

    Link forced his gaze up, staring into the darkness. He slowly walked through the shallow pool of blood, acasionly tripping over limbs. He couldn't get his mind off all these innocent people, thrown down here without a care. Link morned those cursed to this awful fate.

    Eventually, he made it to the end of the piles of bodies, but their blood still slushed around his feet. On the edge of the light, the round room split off to a small hallway. Link made his way towards that.

    When he was almost there, his foot sank a little deeper into the blood. Loud clangs sounded and walls pressed around Link. He thrust the flameblade into a wall, but it shattered off the metal. Link took the Master Sword and tried to jam the walls before they could close around him, but that didn't work either.

    The metal walls trapped Link into a small box too slick to climb. Soon, a metal lid closed the box and clamped down on the sides. Link hit the sword against the walls, but that proved fruitless. It didn't so much as scratch the surface.

    Seconds later, a hissing noise filled the box. Another foul oder stung Link's nostrils. He tried to fight, but his body became heavy, his fingers numb. The Master Sword slipped from his grip, splashing in the pool of blood. Link fell to his knees, coughing.  His head buzzed and ached. Then he was completely on the ground, half his face soaked in another's blood.

    Link felt the box jolt, then move. His eyes fell shut.