Chapter 1: Inertia
Chapter Text
First Law: An object at rest remains at rest, and an object in motion remains in motion at constant speed and in a straight line unless acted on by an external force.
Ganondorf found himself wondering the cold castle halls for hours without anybody coming up to interrupt him, before he noticed a shadow had begun to follow him. He’d bent the knee to Rauru and had been invited to stay at the castle some days before, but he’d noticed the discomfort his unfamiliar presence caused in the castle.
To the untrained eye, it was a kindness, a generous offer to host the King of the Gerudo so that he may act as an envoy for his people.
To Ganondorf, it was a cage. It was a way to control him, to gauge if his pledge had been sincere.
So he had decided to use whatever time he would spend in this wretched Kingdom to learn everything he could and perfect his plan.
Ardi had been a necessary sacrifice. She was too suspicious, too proud to accept Ganondorf as the rightful ruler of the Gerudo. It had been too easy to place the blame of the attack on her, in order to squirm his way into Hyrule’s good graces.
There was a small part of Ganondorf that wondered why it had been easy to discard somebody he had once called a close friend. Any doubt he had vanished quickly with the wave of rage that consumed him when he remembered what Hyrule had done.
Which is why he was there wondering the halls, leering at the obvious display of wealth in the decorations that hung everywhere he looked. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for exactly, a weakness or an escape route, perhaps. Ganondorf couldn’t risk doing anything that would make Rauru suspicious or give any part of his plan away, so he’d been forced to do nothing and play the part of a humble emissary. It had been hell.
But when he noticed the shadow, noticed her quiet footsteps and the brush of her magic trying to hide them, his mind-numbing afternoon became a lot more fun. He was bored enough than messing with her would be a welcome distraction from the monotony of the past few days.
Ganondorf took a sudden turn, through glass doors and out into a balcony that overlooked the Kingdom as the sun set in the distance.
Would she flee, too afraid to confront him out in the open? Probably, Ganondorf thought with a sneer. He had noticed her watching him, had felt the weight of her gaze follow him from across the room. Still, she had not addressed him.
Well, Ganondorf would make sure she’d get bored first, as he leaned across the banister to look out into the distance. After all, he could not possibly think of any better use of his time than to be a mild inconvenience to anybody in Rauru’s court.
He was not expecting her to join him, coming next to him and copying his posture without looking his way.
“King Ganondorf,” Zelda said, her voice doing a good job to hide the nervousness she must be feeling.
“Lady Zelda,” he responded, slowly turning to look at her.
He was pleasantly surprised she had chosen to talk to him. He was elated by her using his rightful title, something Rauru seemed to be refusing to do. Still, she was nothing more than a pawn of the King’s, so he could not let his guard down in her presence.
“Finally decided to step out of the shadows, then? I’m merely exploring the palace, my lady, I don’t think that warrants you following me around.” Ganondorf said, studying her.
The first thing his eyes were drawn to was, of course, that cursed magic stone that hung around her neck. She used it so flagrantly, as if it was just a normal piece of jewelry. He hadn’t been able to see anything else the first time he had seen her in the throne room, but now he tore his gaze away to study the girl in front of him.
Zelda was beautiful, so different from the Queen who was said to be her relative. Her short hair was moving gently with the breeze. Her cheeks colored with the slightest blush as he called her out. Her deep green eyes gazed out into the land and he got the sense that it was as new to her as it was to him.
There was something so familiar about her. A heaviness settled in the pit of his stomach, it made him feel like he’d seen her before.
His left hand itched all of a sudden.
“I’m sorry for following you,” she said, as she turned finally to meet his gaze. Ganondorf knew beyond doubt that she too felt the familiarity coursing through her. “I wanted to talk to you but you seemed lost in thought.”
He looked her up and down, admiring her body, the strength of her spirit as she stared boldly back at him, the pulse of her magic almost tangible in the air.
A welcome distraction indeed.
“You know,” he said conversely, curious as to where this would all end. “King Rauru does not use my title. It’s interesting that you do.”
“It’s only right,” she said, resuming the nonchalant pose from the beginning. Only a trained eye like his would notice the slight tension in her body as she tried to play it off. “I was raised to treat foreign dignitaries with the same respect as I would treat my own.”
“That’s strange,” he let some venom creep into his words. “You would think Rauru would follow the teachings of his relative’s courts.”
He saw her wince and it only made him want to poke and prod further. To tear apart the story they had been telling and to tear her and the kingdom apart with his words.
But then she would leave and might never be bold enough to approach him again. So instead he sighed and looked out to the sun, biting back his words.
They stood in silence, and he started contemplating just going back to his room when she broke the silence.
“Do you believe in fate, King Ganondorf?” Zelda asked, her words coming out a bit quick.
He looked at her with a raised eyebrow. He couldn’t help himself, wanting to get a rise out of her, “My lady, I know you said you wanted to converse with me but I could have never imagined you had ulterior motives.”
Her blush darkened deliciously, “That’s… that’s not…”
Ganondorf laughed, as he continued goading her, “I would have thought a lady of your standing could have come up with better ways of flirting.”
Again, he was sure this would push her away. Either she’d be offended by the implication of his words as he imagined any Hylian would do, or she’d be too embarrassed to continue.
Instead he was surprised by the way she turned to look at him, defiantly trying to be heard. “I’m being serious,” she said. “I want to know if you believe in fate.”
Zelda looked back to the last bits of sun, the red on her cheeks still present but her tone was melancholic. “I used to think we all had an established path. I used to think the Goddesses themselves had carved out these paths for us and watched over us as we walked through them.”
“Now, I’m not so sure,” she said, turning to fix him with her burning gaze. “I doubt these paths are there for us to follow and I’m sure there are no Goddesses who bother to get involved in our lives. So now I’m wondering if a man such as yourself, born into power because of your sex and your culture, believes in Fate.”
“I am King of the Gerudo because I have carved my name into the throne, my lady. It wasn’t something that was just handed to me.” He said, barely managing to keep the venom out of his voice. Was she trying to goad him on as well?
“I supposed so,” she said with a soft smile that perplexed him completely. “And yet, here you are kneeling for a kingdom you have no faith in. Is it because you believe there is no other path for you?”
Well this was not what he had expected at all. “Aren’t you supposed to tell me that I should be grateful to be a part of the wonderful kingdom of Hyrule? Aren’t you, and all the Hylians who follow Rauru, supposed to believe in this 'protection' the King is ever so generous to bestow to all his subjects?”
“There’s a lot that King Rauru and I disagree with,” she admitted. “The way that he’s making other rulers kneel down for him in the name of peace is one of them.”
“And then he just refuses to listen,” she said, frustration coloring her tone. “Queen Sonia says I shouldn’t interfere with the passage of time. Does that imply that there’s nothing we can do about the future? Is it all written down somewhere that things simply must be the way we are? Are we truly helpless against doing anything about the fate the Goddesses decided for us?”
Ganondorf did not quite understand what she was talking about. He knew there was something he was missing but he could hear the conviction in her words, the helplessness she felt. He didn’t say anything as she sighed.
“I’m sorry,” she said, turning back as the last rays of sun left the sky. “I guess I just wanted to hear another’s opinion on the matter. And, I can’t really explain it, but my mind went to you.”
“Well,” he said, feeling the urge to tell her the truth, to bear his soul before her the way she had opened up to him, “it’s difficult to choose simply whether to believe or not in fate.”
“I do not think we are ruled by a singular string of Fate,” he said. “The goddesses grant opportunities, and gifts, to those they deem worthy, but it is us who carve our path through life. A man must take what is rightfully his and see his plans through until the very end. We choose a direction and continue our journey from there.
“An object in motion,” she said, taking in his words.
“What do you mean?” He asked, trying to understand.
“I’m sorry,” she said, “Your words just reminded me of something I learned once.”
She looked ashamed of having voiced her thoughts, as if she had been told before to hold her tongue. “I want to know,” he said, surprised by the softness in his voice.
“I don’t really know, it’s just what you said.” She said after a second of hesitation. “An object in motion tends to remain in motion. To you, we have no Fate predetermined by a godly entity but once we choose a direction, we have no choice but continue until the end.”
“Yes, you understood what I meant.” He was glad to see there was more to this girl than the foolish pawn he had expected her to be. “I believe the worth of a man is in the determination to see his plans through.”
“And have you decided, King Ganondorf, on which path you will see through to the end?” She asked, staring straight into his soul. He could tell there was a lot of weight behind her question, as if she too knew what path he had chosen.
“I have,” he said, as if it were that easy. The stone at her neck seemed to glow even brighter as the darkness of night settled around them.
He saw that his words had some sort of effect on her, and it wasn’t long before she excused herself and left.
Ganondorf thought that he effectively pushed her away and was surprised at how much he actually regretted it.
That night was the first time he used his magic to create a copy of her. Zelda was close to the Queen. It seemed she was not taken too seriously by the King, but it would have to do. His plans started taking shape. With his puppets, he could gather information, seek out a weakness from within.
His first attempt failed spectacularly to capture the girl he had spoken with today. No magic could capture the fire in her eyes, the light she emitted from within.
A body in motion, she had said. He’d just have to try harder.
Some days after that first encounter he was walking by another endlessly long corridor when he heard his name.
“King Ganondorf!” Zelda called out to him, waving him over with a smile. “Would you happen to have a spare minute?”
“I suppose,” he said, letting his curiosity win him over.
“Great!” she said enthusiastically and grabbed his hand to lead him into a room he had not seen before. It was the library and since it was usually inhabited by Mineru and her judgement, he had avoided it like a plague.
“I’m terribly sorry, but I was just reading something and I believe you can help me with a translation.” She said, dropping every pretense in the face of her excitement as she basically shoved a book in his direction.
“You can read Gerudo?” He asked. His surprise was quickly overtaken by suspicion. Why would a monarch of Hyrule bother to learn his language if not to use it against them?
“Only a little,” she said. “I can understand quite a lot but can’t speak as well as I would like to. Your writing system is fascinating to me but I do have to admit I still have a lot to learn. Also, the Gerudo I learned is a bit…different from the one in this book.”
“I had no idea King Rauru kept Gerudo tomes in his library.” His eyes narrowed in suspicion, wondering what knowledge Rauru had deemed worthy of his library.
“He doesn’t,” she said dejectedly. “One of your guards let me borrow her copy when I told her I wanted to practice my reading. There’s no dictionary either, so I couldn’t just look up the meaning of the word.”
He’d have to talk to his guards about playing too nice with the King’s courtiers.
“How did you even start to learn?” Ganondorf asked, still trying to figure out the trick.
“My mother was close friends with a Gerudo woman. When my mother died, she became like a mother to me. I begged her to teach me the language, so I could understand if I ever came to visit her.”
Her words sounded sincere, but he knew he wasn’t getting the whole story.
“She was quite strict with her teaching, actually.” Zelda laughed fondly at the memory. “She let me get away with so much but would always scold me when my pronunciation was wrong. She used to say that Hylians’ tongues were too heavy to speak Gerudo correctly.”
Ganondorf laughed. “All Gerudo mothers are like that,” he said. Either she was an excellent actress or she was telling the truth.
“What word did you need help with?” He said, glancing down at the text she was reading. It was a collection of Gerudo myths. Not that there could be much there that might be dangerous to them, he supposed.
“This one,” she said. “I understand this is a story of the Eight Heroine, about why she led the Gerudo into battle, how the other Seven joined forces to stop her. This last part is what confused me.”
He glanced at it. “The Eight was destined to a fate worse than death,” he read the passage aloud in Gerudo, feeling the words glide like sand across the dunes. He understood what Zelda’s teacher had told her about the language. “Death would be too kind, so the Seven chose to forget her.”
“Ah,” Zelda said. “I was wondering what could possibly be worse than death, but I understand it now.”
“What do you think, my lady?” Ganondorf asked, letting his curiosity win over his suspicion. “Is it a worse fate than death, to be forgotten by your people?”
Zelda looked thoughtful. “I understand why it would be to a Gerudo, to be scorned by their own people, I suppose. But I can’t help but wonder if it wasn’t to her.”
“What do you mean?” He couldn’t stop himself from asking.
“Well, the Eight Heroine did what she believed she had to do. When the giant beast attacked their city, she raised her weapon against it. At first, her sisters stood by her side, and they fought valiantly. Then a message came from Din herself. Din told them the beast was a test to their faith, that if they prayed and believed, no more harm would come to them. Everyone told the sisters to back down, to listen to the message from the Goddess. All of them did, except for the youngest. So, alone, she set out in the night and went to confront the beast by herself. When she returned to her people tired but triumphant, they scorned her. Even her sisters turned their backs to her.”
“But she was right.” Zelda said, the conviction in her tone clear. “If the beast was a threat, the safety of their people was more important than Din getting the worship. Especially considering she did not defend them the first time.”
“That’s right,” he said, almost amused. “I had forgotten you were one to renounce the Goddesses.”
She ignored him, “Do you think she was in the wrong?”
“No,” he said simply. “I would have done the same if my people were threatened.”
“Then no matter what punishment she would have to endure afterwards, what is most important is that her people were safe. Even if they were not thankful about it.” Zelda said, there was an edge to her voice.
“This myth is mostly used by the temples. The popular opinion is that the Eight Heroine was in the wrong. It is used as a cautionary tale to those who doubt,” he said, almost amused. “Last I heard one of the temples is asking for donations of labor to build the statues of the Seven Heroines in the place where they gather. It’s supposed to be an act of faith.”
Ganondorf took her in, telling himself he was only doing it to use what he saw in his creations.
“You know, the way the story is usually told to the public is that a child died when the Eight Heroine killed the beast. Depending on who is telling the story, the reason why may vary. Some say that she knew that a child, one of their own, would die if the beast was defeated, to maintain balance. Others say that Din had warned them that if they disobeyed her, she would not hesitate to punish the Gerudo.” Ganondorf continued.
“So even knowing that one of her own would die, the Eight Heroine did what she did,” Zelda said, mulling over his words.
“Yes,” he said. “It’s easy to forget that part was not in the original myth, though. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it told that way.”
They both stayed silent, looking down at the words on the book.
“Is there any other word you had doubts with?” he asked.
“I’m sure I’ve taken enough of your time, King Ganondorf.” She said, unsure of how he would react. “I wouldn’t want to disturb you.”
“Nonsense,” he said. Though he probably should allow her to push him away, he had to admit he would miss her warmth. “I just want to make sure you are not out there butchering my language too badly.”
Zelda studied him for a second before launching into an animated conversation about all the words she had not understood. She had taken painstakingly meticulous notes in a messy notebook of all every word she had her doubts about.
After that, their interactions just continued to grow. It was obvious that living in the same place for months would mean that they would have to interact pretty frequently. Still, he noticed that she sometimes actively sought him out. She’d ask him about the Gerudo, the language, the culture, the people. She’d ask him about his beliefs, his childhood, his vision of the future.
If it was some attempt at espionage, Ganondorf had to admit it was the most confusing attempt he had ever seen.
What could she possibly get out of knowing that information?
Despite himself, Ganondorf found himself growing fond of their little interactions.
He desired her, of course, and he had to admit that it went beyond the stone at her neck and the inexplicable hunger he felt when he saw her training her magic with Rauru and the other fools that were constantly around him. No, he wanted to know more about her, where she had come from and how she had drawn him to her so effectively.
And the more they conversed, the more he got to know this very strange girl full of contradictions, the more realistic his puppets became. He was never satisfied with them though, not even his magic could create something beyond a poor imitation.
There was a part of him that listened to her, that saw her try so hard in the training Rauru had mandated and in helping Mineru with her research, and it made him doubt his original plan.
Rauru was a tyrant, using false promises and smiles to lure others into kneeling for his empire. He had to be stopped. Initially, he had believed that any amount of bloodshed would be worth it. But if some bloodshed could be avoided…
Ganondorf knew Zelda had been rightfully weary of his intentions at the beginning. But over the past months he had seen her weariness wane, as she got to know him beyond his reputation. His opinion of her had changed over time too. He knew now that she wasn’t a blind follower of the King, that she had very interesting opinions about how a monarchy should rule.
She would have made a wonderful Queen, had things been different.
So what if not all Hylians were like their dreadful King? What if a different Kingdom could be built?
As long as Rauru remained at the head, though, anything different would be impossible.
The voices inside him, that anger that overtook him so easily, said that only blood could bring about change. A necessary sacrifice, like the one added to the story of the Eight Heroine, to bring about a better future.
The path was clear, a plan set in motion long before Ganondorf had even been born. And the ending was clear to him too.
Around the fifth month of his stay in the kingdom of Hyrule, Ganondorf was invited to participate in a festival. They had attempted to explain the reason for such a festivity to him but had hardly paid attention to it before declining the invitation. He knew it would probably not be anything beyond Rauru showing off the richness of his kingdom.
He was just about to head to the Depths to work on his puppets when a knock sounded at his door. Standing there, dressed up for the occasion, was his muse in person.
“Lady Zelda,” he said, “to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?”
No longer did she hide behind those adorable blushes of hers, instead she gifted him a smile as she said, “I am here to drag you down to the festival, Your Majesty.”
He crossed his arms as he leaned against the doorway. “Don’t waste your time, my lady. I’m sure Rauru has already noticed your absence and will definitely miss the presence of his guest of honor.”
She shook her head laughing softly. “I should probably head back soon, it’s just that…”
Zelda fixed him in place with those endlessly green eyes of hers. “Mineru isn’t attending and the Queen is busy and there’s just nobody else there that I could be myself with. You of all people should know that after a while of pretending to be somebody you are not, it gets very tiring.”
“And so you came to me,” he said, mulling over her words and ignoring the pang in his chest that resulted from them.
“There’s actually some good food being served,” she said, trying to catch his attention. “And music and dancing, so I’m sure something might interest you.”
“Mmmh,” he said, “Still doesn’t sound very appealing if I’m being honest. You are going to have to try harder than that to convince me.”
“Well,” she said, and that blush came back at full force. He couldn’t help but trace it with his eyes as it went down her long neck. “There’s also…me, I suppose.”
“Oh?” He said, his grin turning predatory, “Now that’s tempting. You should have led with that.”
She rolled her eyes and laughed at his tease but still that blush refused to leave.
They headed down together, the hallways echoing with their laughter as they conversed easily. The food was passable, which was good by Hyrulian standards, and the party was well underway.
As Zelda spoke to him, recalling the first time she had ridden a construct, Ganondorf realized something. The other leaders were talking with the King animatedly. He could hear the Goron Patriarch’s laughter from way across the room. The Queen was always busy playing host and talking with the several courtiers basically lining up for a second of her time. Beyond that, there were a lot of fake smiles and personalities vying for the good graces of the monarchy, all fighting for the mere scraps while the royalty feasted.
And there was Zelda, so out of place among those hyenas.
And there was Zelda, talking to him, gifting him her smiles, giving some of her Light so freely.
Another possible path forward became clear to him.
“Would you do me the honor of accompanying me in a dance, my lady?” Ganondorf asked.
She looked surprised, as if it would never have occurred to her that he would ask. “Of course,” she said, as if it were really that simple.
He led her out to the dance floor, where the other partners cleared the way easily for the two of them. Her hand fit perfectly against his.
And when Ganondorf put his hand lower than he probably should have on her back, and when he pulled her body closer than he would to any other, she did not back away.
They fought for control at first but were quick to laugh at the mishap as Zelda let him lead. Strange, he thought, if she really was just a lady of the court, she would have been taught to always follow in a dance.
For everything he discovered about her, he also found new depths to her he could not have imagined before.
It was easy to get lost in her, in the feeling of her against him, in the warmth of her smile that she reserved only for him. Ganondorf, however, had made a decision.
“Do you remember the story of the Eight Heroine we talked about, a while ago?” He asked. He spoke softly, in part so that no prying ears could catch his words, in part so that she may lean even closer to him to hear him.
She nodded, searching his face trying to find the reason the mood had turned serious so quickly.
“We talked, back then, about Fate. About sacrifice, about paths set in stone that we are meant to follow.”
He would try to talk to her. At any moment, she could turn around and tell the King he was a threat. There was a part of him that thought that maybe she would understand.
“Zelda,” he said, enjoying the way her name fit in his mouth. “I know what path I have chosen. I know what has to be done.”
Ganondorf did not know what he expected. Fear, perhaps, as that initial suspicion in her was finally proven right. Pain, as the idea of him she had built as they grew closer shattered.
What he did not expect was for her to take his hand, gently even now, and lead him away from the world around them.
He followed her silently down the dark hallways of the castle. He was lost until they came upon that same balcony where she had first approached him.
She shut the doors behind her and all the noise and the kingdom faded away as nothing remained but the two of them.
“I’m sorry,” she said, “Here we won’t have to worry about others listening in.”
He looked at her, wanting nothing more than destroy that feeling of hope that grew in his chest.
Ganondorf looked out to the Kingdom shrouded in night as he spoke.
“Rauru must be stopped. The kingdom of Hyrule has become an Empire, and he sits at the throne of power. Anybody who does not bend the knee becomes a threat that must be stopped.”
He looked at her, asking her to understand, “I have to stop him. What will happen when the whole of the continent is under his rule? What will happen when the Gerudo, the Zora, the Gorons, and the Rito lose their identity, their language in order to fit into the image Rauru has for his empire?”
“You could help me,” he said, meeting her eyes. “If we manage to take him down from the inside, there will be no need to go to war.”
His words were met by silence. She looked at him for a long time, searching for something.
When she spoke, he was surprised to hear the anger in them. “So you stop him, by killing him, I suppose, and then what, Ganondorf? Who will sit in the empty throne? Will you even attempt to pretend it’s what you wanted all along?”
“What happens afterwards?” She continued. “When you realize that Hyrule is not enough and all that anger and all that self-righteousness that you feel haunts the Kingdom for millennia?”
A harsh ringing started in his ears. “What do you mean?” He asked, unsure if he wanted to know the answer.
She sighed, debating how much to trust him. He saw the moment she made her choice, clear as day.
“I know what Queen Sonia said. She’s right of course. Messing with time can be dangerous. They won’t listen to me, anyway.” Ganondorf could swear she was gazing straight into his soul. “But maybe you will. Maybe we still have a way to change things.”
“I’m from the future,” she said. “10,000 years into the future, to be exact. I don’t know what brought me here in the first place, nor do I have any idea if I can ever return to my own time.”
Ganondorf felt his world shift as he heard the words come out of her mouth. “I know exactly where your plan leads, Ganondorf.”
“You don’t win, not now, not ever.” The slightest edge of desperation mixed in with her words. “And all that anger and darkness inside of you comes to life to destroy the Kingdom. We managed to defeat that incarnation of your anger once, but some years later it woke up again. It poisons the land, it hurts all of Hyrule, the Gerudo too, and it corrupts everything it touches.”
“You have to understand,” she said, begging him to listen. “You will not win. You cannot win, not this way.”
“I know that what King Rauru is doing is bad, but this isn’t the way to stop him.” She pleaded.
“Why do you tell me the future, then?” Ganondorf felt hollow, trying to make sense of everything she was saying.
“Because things could be different!” She almost yelled in her conviction. “I haven’t known you for very long but there’s something in me saying that things don’t have to be this way. We are not just some part of a machine that will move endlessly. I have to believe we have a choice, Ganondorf, I have to believe things could be different somehow.”
He looked at her for a long time. The voice in his head quiet for once and the anger that so often took over his actions was swept away by the sight of tears in her eyes.
“I’ve made my choice,” he said, after a while. “And you’ve made yours, my lady. As much as I might wish things could be different…”
He left her there. It made no sense to entertain fantasies of having a choice. As he left, the anger that consumed him was stronger than ever before.
How had he been so stupid as to think she would have agreed to work with him? How could he have hoped that they could have avoided being enemies for once?
Later that night, alone in the dark, he finally did it. The puppet that rose looked exactly like Zelda. He had it walk around, talk in circles like he had seen her do so many times before.
It was a far cry from the real thing, but Ganondorf felt satisfied. Nobody but him would be able to tell the difference, after all.
An object in motion will forever remain in motion, she had said. Ganondorf was determined then, that even in his defeat, in his death, he would remain.
Notes:
Me to TOTK Ganondorf: I will redeem you via any means possible cause Nintendo won’t do it for me. You are too sexy to be a boring, 1 dimensional character.
Listen, there’s so much I do not agree with in the backstory of TOTK/AOI so this is me trying to manhandle the characters and the "cannon" lore a little. Also how could Nintendo drop the bomb saying Ganondorf lived in the palace for 6 whole months and not give us a singular Ganondorf and Zelda interaction? And the puppets?? like make it make sense
Chapter Text
The acceleration of an object depends on the mass of the object and the amount of force applied.
If Zelda had to use a visual to describe the way her mind processed thought, she would use the image of a rushing river, filled with fish swimming faster than the currents in every direction.
When she was younger, her tutors often scolded her, saying that she wasn’t paying attention to her lessons. Zelda couldn’t help it, a question would pop in her head as she listened to what they said and with it, so many others that wouldn’t stop. If she didn’t voice these thoughts, the little fishes would swim away in the current and be gone way too quickly.
As she grew older she learned to hold back her questions and her rambling thoughts, even if stiff silence made her hands itch.
That did not mean the river of her thoughts changed in any way.
The hours and hours spent praying were a particular form of torture for her. For a while, she had no problem channeling every one of her wishes to the goddesses. She asked for their wisdom, their strength, their courage. She never felt any of it herself.
And that frustration, that helplessness at the emptiness she felt as she so uselessly tried and failed to call her magic into existence, made her mind wonder.
She never gave up, how could she when the fate of her kingdom rested in her hands alone?
But after a while, her mind would start to wonder.
An hour of kneeling at the ground of the church would make her legs grow numb. She couldn’t understand why the goddesses would demand this pain from her over and over and over again. She couldn’t understand why if she was meant to be the reincarnation of a goddess or their favored daughter or the holder of a piece of the Triforce or whatever the legends say she was meant to be, she felt like nothing more than a useless, human, weak girl.
There were many things she didn’t understand. Her mother, who might have had a semblance of an answer, was long gone. Her father was no help, telling her she should devote herself further to her prayers.
So in these moments her mind wondered, they went to things she could understand.
She recited laws of physics, things that she knew would remain true throughout time and space.
She thought of the mathematical equations scribbled in the various notebooks scattered throughout her study, trying to solve for those missing pieces that would make her inventions work.
She tried to make sense of how magic would fit into the world she loved to study. What laws it would follow, what rules would be set.
She thought of the stolen pieces of Sheikah tech she had collected over the years, piecing them together in her mind.
In her mind, she imagined that one day, one of her inventions would have the ability to do something that would save them all. She imaged that one day, she would save her kingdom with what power she did have and not the power the Goddesses refused to let her borrow. That it would be thanks to her that her kingdom would survive.
And time and time again she would be reminded that her useless fantasies would do her no good.
Link was a welcome distraction. At first, she hated him and the role of the perfect hero he played. As she got to know him, she realized that the whole hero thing wasn’t an act on his part, he was just that good.
It made her hate him even more.
Why was it so easy for him? Why did the sword he was given fit so perfectly in his hand? Why was he just simply born with the Courage needed to wield it?
Then he had saved her in the desert and she started thinking about how harshly she had treated him. As she started to look at him in a different way, she realized he was as much of a prisoner in his role in all this as she was.
It wasn’t fair, for either of them.
And then, as he listened to her questions and her thoughts without finding her annoying, for the first time in a while, Zelda realized she had found someone who she could be herself with, someone who didn’t see her just as her role. She had found a friend.
With all the fear, all the chaos looming over them, that is what she needed the most.
“Did you know that Hot-footed frogs have an incredibly short lifespan in comparison to other frogs?” She asked one day as they travelled to yet another temple for another useless attempt to wake her powers.
Away from the palace, away from her father and her duties, alone in the road with Link, though, she had found it her favorite place to be. They had set up a small camp to rest for a while and Zelda was sitting in front of the fire.
Link came to sit next to her, so she could see his hands as he spoke. “You knew that even though you tried to feed me one?” Zelda could see his smile, or the closest thing Link had to a smile while he was on duty.
Taking his voice was still not enough for the goddesses, apparently.
“Isn’t interesting to think how time for them must move differently?” Zelda asked, not really needing an answer, just needing to voice out her question. “The same way that time moves faster now than when you were a child. The same amount of time takes up a different proportion of your lifetime. And now… well I feel as if I’ve only just had a birthday and somehow we’re only a week away from my next.”
“Where do you think lost time goes to Link?” She ignored the tears forming at the corners of her eyes, “I read somewhere that energy is not created or destroyed, it is just transformed into something else. Do you think time is like that too?”
Zelda let out a sigh, feeling Link shift so he was slightly closer to her but feeling like he was somehow even further away than before.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she said, furiously wiping at the tears that would not stop coming. She knew she could cry in front of Link, she just didn’t want to burden him even further with her sadness.
Link stood up and moved away, doing something behind her so she could not see what he was doing. After about a minute, he came back, holding something wrapped in tinfoil. Without hesitation, he tossed the things in his hand into the fire.
They both watched in silence as the sweet smell of cinnamon filled the air around them.
Link turned to look at her, slightly sheepish, as he signed. “I’m sorry. I’m not very good with words but my mother used to make me this when I was upset.”
And he turned to open the package he had tossed into the fire to reveal a baked apple that he had added cinnamon and sugar to so that they spices would mix with the warm apple.
He smiled at her, an actual, small, real smile. “It tastes like happiness,” he signed after she received her gift.
Zelda brought it up to her nose, taking in its warmth and sweetness. She took that first bite, and the taste washed away the saltiness of her tears. “It does taste like happiness,”
And there certainly was a lot to be said about time and its subjectivity because her last moments with her friends. She didn’t have time to say goodbye to any of the other champions before they were gone. Her father, with all that had been left unsaid. Urbosa…
And then Link died in her arms and there was no time at all. The Sheikah rushed his body to the Shrine of Resurrection and she headed to the castle after talking with the Great Deku Tree.
And then time did not exist. She had no body and was wielding the power of the Goddess so she supposed it would make sense for time not to exist.
And eternity was dreadful. Zelda could not lose her focus away from keeping the calamity sealed, and remembering all that had happened would not help anybody now. So she locked her grief and her fear and everything else that threatened to overwhelm her.
But eternity was also boring and like it had happened to her before, her mind often started wondering. Things, however, no longer made so much sense.
Maybe it would be easier to just let it all go, to let herself be swallowed up by the calamity. There would be nothing out there for her, if Link never woke up. The world she had once known would be completely different. Maybe she should just…
“You told me you had already saved your kingdom once, but I hadn’t realized you were still a child when you did it the first time.” A voice spoke out through the chaos.
Zelda turned to see a tall, handsome, Gerudo man (the impossibility of him fascinated her) looking at her curiously. “I’m not a child,” Zelda said too quietly.
“What’s that?” He said, “I couldn’t hear you.”
“I said I am not a child.” Zelda said, frustration creeping into her tone.
“Yeah right,” he said, “How old are you? 13?”
“I do not look 13!” She replied. “I am 17 years old. I am of legal age.”
“Well, I don’t think you could order a noble pursuit in any canteen so by Gerudo standards that makes you a child.” He laughed warmly.
“Who are you?” Zelda asked, “How are you even here? And what did you say at the beginning? Have we met before?”
“Always with your questions,” he said, shaking his head but still smiling. “It’s good to see that some things never change.”
“As for the other questions,” he continued. “You once made me wait for answers for the sake of ‘not messing with the timeline’ so you are going to have to wait for them. My name, however, is Ganondorf.”
Zelda felt her brow furrow as she tried to make sense of what he had said, but still she couldn’t help but make a joke about it. “You were named after Calamity Ganon?”
The resounding laugh quieted the beasts unending shrieks for a while.
So Zelda got to know her fellow prisoner in the battle against the Calamity. He didn’t give her many details, especially since it seemed like he did not remember a lot about the life he had lived.
“A thousand years is an incredibly long time to live alone, Princess,” he had told her.
There was a lot that went unsaid too, about how he had come to be involved in all this, about when and how they had met in his past and her future.
But he was there to distract her in the worst moments, just when she was about to give up. It was hard for him to talk to her, but he always seemed to know when she needed to be pulled out of her head.
And he would teach her Gerudo words and laugh at her accent like Urbosa did sometimes. He would ask her to explain what Sheikah technology was like and listen to her stories in the labs with Purah.
He would ask her about the laws of physics she loved so much and listen to her argue about how little of it made sense now, just like Link used to do.
“No, it’s just literally driving me insane.” Zelda had argued during a particularly grueling day. Ganondorf had come to her, finding her wrapped in a dark cloud of sadness that was begging her to give up. So he had distracted her with small talk until he found a subject that brought back her spark.
“Have you ever heard anything that comes out of your mouth, Princess?” He said, teasing her, “Most people would argue that you are insane already.”
He ignored the huff she let out, “But explain it to me anyway.”
Zelda rolled her eyes at his words. “How long has it been since I came here? No idea, right? You say it’s been a thousand years for you but I know history, and your time sound nothing remotely like what was happening a thousand years ago. That just means that time has absolutely no meaning here.”
“Right,” he said, tone unsure.
“Well so much of physics is seen through the lens of time. Velocity is the change of movement in time, acceleration is the change of velocity in time, and so on and so on.”
“But” she said, “Acceleration can also be measured in other ways, like when there is force applied to something then that and the mass of the object should be the acceleration of the object and why are you laughing?”
“I’m sorry, Princess.” Ganondorf said, looking at her fondly, “It’s like you are speaking an entirely different language at this point.”
“Oh,” Zelda felt embarrassed, “I’m sorry, I just get excited and tend to ramble.”
“Don’t feel ashamed,” he said, “I do want to understand, so take your time with it. After all, we’ve got all the time in the world.”
Link finally woke up and they figured out 100 years had passed. At least with Link awake, it became easier to find something else to focus on rather than how Zelda had started feeling her own power weakening.
Ganondorf was also finding it harder and harder to go speak with her, but they watched Link rediscovering Hyrule together sometimes.
The both of them groaned as they watched Link face a white maned lynel with nothing but a questionable amount of bombs coming out of the Sheikah slate. It if wasn’t for Mipha’s power they would have witnessed the legendary hero get wiped out by the explosion that came out of his own bomb.
They watched as he prepared to head into the castle, knowing the battle that was coming their way.
“Maybe, when Link defeats the calamity you will be set free too.” Zelda had said to him, unsure of how all this would turn out. She wasn’t sure what would happen to her, and she wasn’t sure which option sounded better either.
“I don’t think so, Zelda,” Ganondorf said, “You were the one who said it best, but I know in what direction I am headed, and my journey does not end here.”
“But you said we met in my future, does that mean that this isn’t over?” Zelda tried not to let the panic overcome her. “If we defeat the calamity now, do we not win against the evil that is plaguing Hyrule?”
“I have no idea, Princess,” He sounded so tired. “Honestly, none of it makes sense. Real life cannot be defined as simply as your theorems. If not just look at your Hero, everything he does seems to be in direct contradiction with logic.”
Zelda laughed and that was the last time they spoke.
Link defeated the Calamity and Zelda was able to call her magic to vanish the evil. As they stood in Hyrule field, there were so many questions Zelda wanted to ask and too many things that seemed to be escaping from her mind as her human body tried to make sense of 100 years as a goddess.
Instead of asking all that wanted to, she asked, “Do you really remember me?”
And Link had not answered with words, or with one of those smiles that now came so freely to him, instead he pulled her into a tight embrace and Zelda felt warmth for the first time in a century.
There was a big part that was missing from her memories, somebody, but for all Zelda tried, she could not remember what it was.
Rediscovering gravity turned out to be a bigger challenge than she had anticipated. “It’s funny how heavy a body can feel,” she said as she tried and failed once more to mount her horse as easily as she would have done in the past.
Link came over and lifted her up so easily, so free with the way that he reached out to her that it literally made Zelda speechless.
They made their way to Kakariko, then to the other leaders to pay their respects to the ones lost in the calamity.
Zelda cut her hair and felt a huge weight off her back.
Link made them spiced baked apples and both of them laughed when they noticed they were both crying.
They made their way to Hateno, where they both slept in the same bed without thinking too much about it.
Zelda could not get used to sleeping. Link had terrible nightmares about failing.
They healed together.
The Kingdom rebuilt little by little. She had a new study that was soon covered wall to wall with all her new designs and all the plans she had for the future.
Link hunted monsters and chased cuckoos. Zelda started teaching classes at the new school. Every day somebody came up to them asking for help with something and the two of them, of course, found a way to help them.
And in between it all, they tried their best to take some of that time for themselves. A picnic down at Lurelin Beach and falling asleep cuddled on the beach. Breaking and entering a newly discovered Zonai ruin in the middle of the jungle. A festival in Gerudo where they both got drunk off Noble Pursuits.
A year passed quickly, then two, then five. Again the passage of time was not as straightforward as Zelda would have liked.
The two of them, and the entire Kingdom for that matter, had lost so much, so many people. The best way to honor them, Zelda had decided, was to give everything she could to ensure the Kingdom’s future.
So she crafted memorials to those lost during the calamity and participated in taking apart the Divine Beasts and the Guardians.
Link held her afterwards and let her cry it all out.
She led the Kingdom forward. She was no longer a Princess, but so many people turned to her to ask what they should do next, and she was not going to let them down. In those last two years, she watched as new villages appeared and the people reorganized little by little.
Zelda really should have known better. She got these strange dreams at times, telling her she had forgotten something important. She tried telling herself it was just anxiety, the stress her body had been under still trying to heal. But then again, she had once read somewhere about a theory that said that everything that can go wrong would eventually go wrong.
Sure, there was still a lot to do, but their plans seemed to be moving in the right direction and everything seemed finally at peace.
And then the Gloom started rising from underneath Hyrule Castle.
Notes:
*Slaps the roof of this fic* This bad boy fits so many concepts of physics
lilacsigil on Chapter 1 Sun 30 Nov 2025 11:13AM UTC
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Justbecause13 on Chapter 1 Tue 02 Dec 2025 12:52AM UTC
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geekynerdydorkyme on Chapter 1 Mon 01 Dec 2025 01:41AM UTC
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Justbecause13 on Chapter 1 Tue 02 Dec 2025 12:48AM UTC
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LadyHoneydee on Chapter 1 Sat 13 Dec 2025 12:57PM UTC
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Justbecause13 on Chapter 1 Mon 15 Dec 2025 02:21AM UTC
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lilacsigil on Chapter 2 Wed 10 Dec 2025 11:00AM UTC
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Justbecause13 on Chapter 2 Mon 15 Dec 2025 02:18AM UTC
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geekynerdydorkyme on Chapter 2 Thu 11 Dec 2025 12:03AM UTC
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Justbecause13 on Chapter 2 Mon 15 Dec 2025 02:20AM UTC
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