Second Hand of the Chosen Hero

Chapter Eleven

She expected to sleep all day and wake up to find out that all of this was a fucked up dream. She expected to wake to him being gone.

One was more likely than the other, and yet neither was the reality.

In reality, she woke up after a few hours and got out of bed solely so she could change clothes. So she could get out of her boots as she'd not even bothered to do initially, and take her hair down. She should have brushed it, but she still didn't have the needed energy for that. She laid back down, and, again, to her surprise, woke up again in a few hours.

This time, it was through interruption. She'd left her bedroom door open without having even thought about the fact that there was someone in her house- particularly a boy in her house. She was just used to it. Similarly, she was unused to waking to the sound of someone knocking on her door to get her attention.

Zelda always just bounced in bed with her. Or if she didn't feel quite so nice, she'd lay down with her first. Regardless, it didn't register to her at first that it was something, not up until Link said "you awake, Tya?"

Upon hearing that, she shifted some and, though reluctant, shoved down the edges of her blankets and adjusted to look at him. A lot of things occurred to her in that moment. Why was he there, why was he waking her, what did he want, etc. But she voiced none of it and just pushed herself to sit up, wincing both at her shoulders and at her palms.

"Yes," she said, flopping back against her headboard and looking at her hands. Having shed her sweater at some point through the night, she was left in a tank top that allowed her to grimace at the scratch marks she'd gained from the needlessly aggressive keese. She'd forgotten to clean it. She'd forgotten a lot of things.

"Your bird is uninjured, yes?" She asked, using the back of her hand to rub some of the grogginess from her eyes. Link entered, clearly somewhat hesitant which she didn't notice until she dropped both of her hands back into her lap.

"Yeah," he confirmed. "They... St-Still hadn't fou-found Zel's when I left."

She bit softly at her lower lip. It was a terrible thought, that the poor thing was lost and injured somewhere. Maybe that had changed though. Or perhaps she could help after Link headed back out.

A long sigh left her. There was the smallest part of her that was relieved that she wouldn't be returning to the surface, a part that was dashed so quickly as Link asked "did you w-want to get ready to-to go? It's not light out yet but I fig-figured-figured we could save all the d-daylight."

That left her watching him, picking at the edge of the cover as her tired mind tried to comprehend his words. There was a deep flutter in her ribs- relief over the ease at which he accepted her presence. "Link..."

His head tilted with a curiosity that silenced her.

She was a mixture of so many feelings... It wasn't intentional that her question came out with a nearly aggressive wonder- complete disbelief, as she asked "Why?"

"Why?" He replied. Straightening up again, he thought over the question with an expression that said it hadn't occurred to him that there was another option.

"Am I not a hindrance to you?" She asked. "I do not know how to fight, I haven't the capacity to traverse such harsh terrain- I am essentially useless to you. My only saving grace would be the fact that I am decent enough in knowing how to survive, but I'm not entirely sure that that extends outside of Skyloft. I have no experience with the surface. No experience with anything actually."

"But you wanted to come," was his answer, said with an innocence that almost stunned her. Of course, she did. She wanted to help, she wanted to explore, she wanted to learn. But she was a liability. She was dead weight that was going to slow him down.