New Horizons - A Skyward Sword Aftermath Story

6 - Planning and Preparation

"So, did you guys find anything today?" Piper asked, bringing platters of rice cakes to the hungry teenagers. Like vicious remlits, the group dived at the savoury meal, grabbing as many they could get their hands on before they all disappeared. Groose smirked devilishly as he grabbed a huge pile at once.

"Hey! That's not fair! You just scooped them up with your massive shovel hands!" Yelled Cawlin, who had the misfortune of picking them up individually, because of his much smaller hands.
"Tough luck!" the larger boy snorted. "It's not my fault you're a man in the body of an 8 year old kid."

Ignoring the boys, Karane answered the older woman's question. "Yes, Pipit and I did, actually!"

Everyone fell silent and turned to the red-haired girl. She continued. "We found a great fishing spot not too far from here. It's a giant pond with all kinds of mysterious fish species we haven't seen before. I'm sure that'd be a handy place to keep in mind."

Pipit turned to Zelda. "As well as a place for food, you might be interested in creating a journal for the new fish species, too! I don't know, it seems like your kind of thing."

The latter's eyes sparkled as she gave him a big smile. "You're right! I might do that one day!"
"What did you two find?" Stritch asked, looking at Link and Zelda. The pair gave each other a guilty look, for they hadn't actually found anything immediately useful. Zelda slowly started.
"Well... didn't find anything."

Before anyone could question her, she piped up again. "But! We did find this place!"

Everyone became intrigued, and leaned in towards her, waiting for her to continue.
"We...found this strange place. The remains of a town from the long, distant past."
"A ghost town?!" Karane gasped. "That would be so fun to explore!"
"It's a town from the era of the Goddess, and was once home to our ancestors." Zelda added.

Everyone ooh-ed and ah-ed at the fascinating story.

Link also had his input.
"Also, it seems that this land has a name."
Everyone gave him a curious look.
"We found these ancient engravings." Zelda explained. "They were badly damaged, but we could figure out that it said 'The Land of H- - -le'. It's just, we don't know what this name beginning with H could be."

The group sat there silently wracking their brains, thinking about what the missing letters could possibly be.

"Oh Hylia, this is difficult!" Cawlin sighed in frustration. Groose's eyes widened as the little lightbulb in his head suddenly lit up.

"Hylia!" He yelled out. Everyone suddenly turned to him, and the red-head explained.
"This was Hylia's land once, which could explain the H."
"Hylile. Hmm...Doesn't fit." Stritch muttered, rubbing his chin. Groose rolled his eyes.
"Of course it don't, ya idiot!"
"Yeah it definitely isn't that." Added Pipit. "However, Groose might be onto something!"

The large boy proudly crossed his arms. "I think that was pretty smart of me...what would you do without me, eh?"
"Well, Mr Know-It-All," Karane said mockingly. "What did you, Cawlin and Stritch find today?"

Suddenly, Groose's confident expression vanished, and he stared at his friends, awkwardly scratching the back of his head. The other boys looked back at him, unsure of what to say.

"Well uh... We didn't really find any food, either." Stritch mumbled, looking at his feet.
"We did find these small birds though!" Groose defended them with.
Karane narrowed her eyes at him. "There's small birds everywhere here, Groose."

Cawlin explained. "No! These ones are different! They're quite...creepy, actually. They're white, round, and make this weird kind of 'cuck-oo' sound."

Everyone stared at the three, completely unimpressed.
"Yeah, right." Pipit dismissed. "You three just messed around all day, didn't you? So you felt the need to make up some strange lie."
"What?! No!" Groose argued back. "We saw that these strange birds lay loads of eggs. Very tiny ones. If they're anythin' like loftwing eggs, perhaps we stand a chance of usin' them as ingredients!"