• Welcome to Thousand Roads! You're welcome to view discussions or read our stories without registering, but you'll need an account to join in our events, interact with other members, or post one of your own fics. Why not become a member of our community? We'd love to have you!

    Join now!

Non-Pokémon Between the Third and the Fourth

K_S

Unrepentent Giovanni and Rocket fan
Between the Third and the Fourth


Genre
: Legend of Zelda x over, Windwaker meets A Link Between Worlds.

Ranking: Teen

Warnings: Alluded child abuse, may update as time goes on.


AN: A Non-'mon fic, based on an odd crossover. Drawn from the games of the "Windwaker" (A personal favorite of mine) meeting the criminally underappreciated "A Link Between Worlds".

Summary: Where Ravio the cowardly thief from Hyrule's dark world scraps what courage he has, holds it tight, and tosses open a portal to his world's twin in an attempt to cozy up to the Hero of a real Hyrule and manipulate- HELP them get their act enough together to save two worlds for the price of none.

But magic was a tricky thing, and the Ravio was no Hero, Wizard, or anything special.

Just desperate.

Little wonder things went wrong.

From an outsider's perspective.... the boy they'd known as Link changed, in bits and pieces. He opened up as he aged. Acquiring a chatterbox's droll manner, he quit pestering his elders about tales of heroes with swords, taking up crafts with such enthusiasm and skill so keen it was a wonder.

The Sea that so entranced him became a thing to be dismissed, and those times spent visiting and revisiting Outset's forested fringe were no more. The village elders called it growing up, they didn't know half of it.


INTRODUCTION: The Jump, A Landing, Enter the Wrong Hero Please...

AN: Grammarly ran 8.1.2021 with some sentence clean-up.

Spitting seawater and half drowning (and more than half cursing, which wasn’t helping the downing bit one bit) he flailed to land.

Leaving soggy lines in the sand because halfway between safe and not his legs gave out. He thumped into the soft sands, and walking was no longer viable, so dragging becomes a thing. His thing.

The sea is slapping his backside as if kicking him out to and the salt wasn't helping his bruises at all. Regardless of aquatic encouragement, he’d made it up and out. Surf a thing to his back he flopped on his side with a wheeze and took to gasping for varieties sake. And because the surf was ages behind him he indulged all the proper throes of melodrama. He rolled and groaned, the motion left him clad in more sand than anything, still, this was part of his thing. A good batch of sulking after near-death made him feel less... lesser.

Because though he swore, up down right left and center to stop, he'd still wallowed in the "crying because he wasn't dead" part of not dying.
Sulking at least was a bit less wussy and gave him a reason to not do anything for a little.

Also, in his personal experience, a good sulk felt good. Almost as good as a good swear fest after getting to the bottom of Thief Town's strongest cup.

Ashore and shaking and shaken (because this was not how it was supposed to go, drowning was not part of the plan), he lay still. Rolling one last time to better see the ocean at his back.

Above something winged and unfamiliar screamed. A short abbreviated sort of screech. Others answered, and above they wheeled. White and near white and so bright their edges all but burned as he stared at them with his sensitive eyes. Something was wrong, there were no Oceans on Lorule, never had been, never could be. And since this place was supposed to be a mirror of his own world, Hyrule was meant to be as landlocked as its dark twin, his homeworld.

So this ocean, right here, in front of him, was all wrong.

Yes, he was supposed to somewhere else, and yes by name alone his destination was synonymous with heights and brightness and some of that was to be expected... But this was too much. This was a where where there were oceans where his house was supposed to be. And that was wrong, wronger than wrong because his house was on a rise.

And there were no fish or ghost skeleton fish upon the bare eroded rocks he could see.

And there weren’t any deeper down. Not when he dug down one day (many days), seeking treasures, digging madly in desperation to show there was some worth somewhere that wasn’t totally unsafe. And he'd got nothing but roots and grime for his trouble. No fish, no salt, no... ocean ghosts... No ocean anything.

So why in Demise's name was there an ocean here?

“Big brother!” Shrill with hysteria, horribly young, the voice’s owner burst out of the foliage, kicking up sand and was more the impression of flailing and running than features that made sense to his tired brain. He caught a glimpse of sky blue, a maybe dress, and then there were arms thrown around his side. She was warm, and close, stooping over him, and what little of the world he could see was lost in a curtain of gold as she was holding him up and holding him tight all at once. And she had hair, a thick long net of it. “What were you thinking?”

Wordlessly his mouth opened and he closed it without saying a word.

Because he wasn't a brother. Not unless his folks had somehow had a kid, then chucked that kid into this never-neverland ocean world and hadn't thought to tell him about it. Still shaking, he wound an arm about her, squeezing with one arm and holding them both up from falling with the other. He was clammy and gritty with salt and yuck, but she didn’t squirm away. She was just warm and near and not letting go. the girl who called him "big brother" bobbed against him, maybe crying. The snuffling into his shoulder made maybe into certainty.

And though he wasn’t a hero or heroic, most of the legends said pretty strongly it was bad to let girls cry. So he didn’t. Muttering wordless nonsense, and worded nonsense like “I’m here, I’m ok,” and a few lies besides. Because, why not? He did what he could to still those tears. He wasn’t like any heroes, and he had a chill queer feeling this when and where‘d just lost there’s in a permanent sort of way. That this was the trade-off, him here, and her without... her big brother.

As for his when and where, well they’d lost their pseudo hero because this was a one-way trip and he’d known it setting out. He’d known the deal, signed the contract, and jumped from his world to this one...

And it wasn't like he was doing something irretrievably stupid like jumping off a cliff or something. There wasn't one for... well there was one actually. Way up. Up enough that when he spotted it he'd thought it was a mountain. But, nope there was a path, an edge jutting out waaaay up, so high up looking up made his neck hurt.

"You jumped!" The girl sobbed against him.

And alright if she thought she'd seen him jump from up there... Well, if his "big brother" had jumped up from there... Ravio'd be a wreck too. Whoever had made this jump was an “A” class stupid with a bell atop his dunce cap.

“Would…” Mouth dry he licked his lips tasting salt and bitter with a bit of iron he tried again. “Would it help if I promised to never ever be that stupid ever again?”

It wasn’t a hard promise. Still, she nodded, hiccuped, and leaned enough into his hug that he went down under it. With a laugh, more hysteria than anything else, he groaned. “You’re squishing me, gah, can’t breathe…”

“Being squished serves you right big brother! It’ll teach you not to do stupid things!”

Clearly promises meant nothing to this little girl with golden hair. Neither did cries for mercy when her fingers descended and she tickled him so much he nearly rolled squealing back into the water. There definitely was a squelch of mud under him when he caught his breath. She had sensibly let him roll into the muck as punishment for being stupid.

Therefore it was more than just when he picked up some pebbly muck, picking out the worst of the rocks, and tossing it at her as revenge. After all, muck just had to be shared, and he was a sharing type of guy. And she’d gotten him wet right after he thought he might be finding out what dry was like… so there.

Her retaliation was quick and sure. And he was scraping gunk out of his hair for it. Still, this was normal for this little girl, and assured of her world’s rightness (because he was alright and it was all fine) she ran. So young, she missed the obvious. Like how he was unsure of everything. From getting up to his first steps getting a gait going. Still, unease aside, he scrambled after her. Staggering a bit as he found a rhythm closer to one he remembered as right.

Luckily for him, she was so young, so very young. She never looked back. Simply sure once she'd assured. She plied catcalls with taunting, and the occasional terra firma tossed his way when he’d lagged and gotten turned about at one point.

He wasn't allowed the time to realize in his head that beaches were different than stories had made them sound. That they weren’t at all like the pictures had been. They went on and on forever it seemed and his feet felt that truth, his eyes saw it, swam at the space that was seemingly unending and thus daunting.

In the distance, above, hopefully not their goal were spires of green that might be mountains. Of a short kind. But they couldn't be mountains, homes, Lorule's were broad and brown with bramble skirts, thier tip tops were grey granite and ice, with skulls piled atop the ice by the monster tribes that lived there. Those familiar peaks were so alien from the green stick things he had to take a moment to take in these... green sticks... and let his brain break.

But clearly breaks, brain ones or otherwise, were against the rules.

“Come on slowpoke, we gotta get to Grandmama’s house, we’re gunna be late!”

He let her lead, being more careful not to get turned about. His thoughts felt like ghosts in his head that were tinged with wonder, a bizarre inventory of have nots. He’d never had a grandma before, he’d never had a sister either, and he’d only heard of both never having met anyone with either or. Next of kin were legends. How this person had had both was nearly enough to make Ravio trip from shock.

And how this person had had these rare wonderful things like living family (who cared, even if throwing muck was an odd way of showing it the preceding panic hadn’t been) and had jumped from beyond stupid high to dive into the ocean…

To dive to their death...

Well, they’d earned it, that stupid person's cap. More than. And maybe even their death, if they were dead. This "big brother" had lost something in jumping and perhaps if Ravio’d believed in the Merciful Three or their Judgments he’d called of this earned too.

Save he hadn’t done anything, important or special, to earn anything special or important in return.

Which left the little matter of debts, of scales unbalanced, and the collector who’d make sure they were.

And wouldn't that be a panic? Of owing celestial things... debts because he'd taken someone else's jump and lived when they had not. By accident even. The idea of that type of tax collector would send anyone sane into a panic if you really thought about it.

Save Ravio was sure, bone-deep, that there wasn't anyone at the end of the line with an abacus and tally. There wasn't anyone around to balance the scales. The Three had closed up shop ages ago, and the building had rotted down, and no one bothered with it ever after. After all abandoned things were either sick traps, cursed, or haunted.

So no worries.

And that assurance was enough for now. He kept running, and while running he thought, and was careful to lag so she’d lead, this sister whose name he hadn’t heard yet, that wasn’t his but in a weird way was.

Sorta, kinda, in a roundabout way anyway that was making his head hurt to think about it.

Blaming the pain on the bright sun that most certainly was not natural, Ravio, pseudo hero from a world that’d never been and never was, at least here. just tried to keep upright and moving forward.

Considering his body was shorter and a bit squatter than before his jump it wasn't easy. Running didn’t feel right without a bit of a loupe to it and this body just wasn’t giving him that. About halfway between here and there, he managed to get the rhythm. Tossing a bit of a hop into his steps because while it might not be perfect, it worked. He'd get it to work. And with effort he did. Because in Lorule running was a thing. His thing. And he wasn’t going to cede it to this never land’s weird rules unless he had to.

She, of course, saw him and tried to mime him as many young things do. And between giggles (because no he did not run like that thank you very much) he corrected and she’d found the game of it. Not comprehending the spirit behind it, that running had to be a thing you did well. Because, monsters. But for this little girl, it was more skip than speed and considering everything... It was fair imitation without the understanding, and for now, that was fine for a little while longer.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom