LoZ: Bermuda Triangle ch. 6

"Do not think me completely without honor. I'm more than willing to give you a sporting chance," Ghirahim said, snapping his fingers again. A black sword appeared in front of him and he caught it. "It's been eons since I faced a worthy opponent, let's see what you can do... Have at you!"

He crouched down and pulled his sword back, looking like he was about to charge. Cleo readied herself, holding up her shield. She braced for the strike, but was nonetheless nearly off her feet when the sword hit, it's pure black streak trailing behind. She let out a yelp of surprise, regaining her balance. She just realized how abnormally strong he was. Cleo tried to swipe at him, but he leapt back with amazing lightness. She ran after him, letting out a war cry. She swung hard as Ghirahim parried. He pushed her back and struck before she could defend herself again. She let out a shriek as she felt white hot pain in her shoulder.

Ghirahim started licking the blood off his blade as Cleo clutch her bleeding shoulder. Feeling frustrated, she tried attacking again, only for her sword to be caught between the two main fingers of his free hand, to her immense disbelief. "No way," she mouthed when he suddenly pulled away her sword and threw it up behind him, completely disarming her. It landed, imbedded, into the wall just barely out of reach. Ghirahim swiped at her again, but she ducked and dodged passed him. Ignoring the stinging pain, she sprinted as fast as she could toward the wall and practically ran up it to get her sword back.

After pulling it out of the wall and landing back on the floor, Cleo turned around in time to see him launch his next attack. Ghirahim snapped his fingers, making daggers appear and he sent them flying at her. She ducked behind a small table she knocked over. As she hid, she heard another digital chime and peeked over. Her opponent was gone. Cleo walked out, trying to spot him, but then he appeared right next to her and gave her a good hard kick. After she crashed to the floor, Ghirahim tried to plunge his blade into her. She rolled out of the way in time and got up quickly.

They faced each other intently for a whole minute (which felt like an eternity), then they both charged at once. They passed by in one clashing instant and stopped in their tracks... Then Cleo fell to one knee, her hand on her shoulder again. The pain had intensified, thankfully she didn't get hit this time. Not only had she managed to block his attack, she had also left a cut on Ghirahim's cheek. He slowly turned around and she could now see the cut, but instead of red blood oozing out, Cleo was a bit stunned by black inky blood.

"Is that your best? You left one... little... scrape... after all that struggle?... Pity, I expected more of a challenge from you than that. Now I'm getting perfectly bored of you." After listening to Ghirahim's rant, Cleo realized too late how much she was out of her league. He was right, she could barely touch him, he was too fast, too good. As her sword drooped, Ghirahim saw his chance and teleported to her and, with amazing strength, grabbed her by the throat and pinned her to the wall. As she choked and struggled, he pointed his rapier at her heart. "It's too bad really, I was so hoping this fight would drag out longer. But now it's time to say good-bye."

Cleo stopped struggling and stared into his eyes. I'm going to die, she thought. I'm really going to die... It's all over... I'm sorry dad, I won't be coming back... at least... I'll be with mom again...

She closed her eyes, readying herself for what was coming... except it didn't. Before Ghirahim could finish her off, there was a loud, high-pitched, shriek as something large and brown flew in through the glass doorway and attacked him. Cleo felt herself drop to the floor and started coughing. She looked up and saw, to her astonishment, that it was an owl.

It was pecking and clawing at Ghirahim's face as the Demon Lord tried to hit it. "Get away, you stupid bird!" Cleo watched as the owl pulled itself away and flew right over her back through the glass doorway. It landed on the railing, looked back at her and hooted urgently. She knew immediately what it was trying to say to her, she ran back out onto the balcony. Ghirahim was recovering from the attack and would soon be after her. She climbed up on the railing and, quickly examining the area below, jumped off. She landed on the hood of a car (it's siren went off upon impact), rolling right off to break her fall*. The second Cleo was standing on solid ground, she ran like mad, not daring to look back. "I'll get you girl, and your little owl too!!" she heard from the balcony right after she ducked into the tropical shrubbery, clearly out of Ghirahim's sight.

---

Cleo had reached the beach and took a whiff of salty air and heard the roaring waves. She had stopped running when her feet reached the water, her hands on her knees, panting. She felt something vibrating in her backpack and she unzipped it to pull out her cellphone. She glanced at the name: David Hayster. Her father must've been woken up by all that noise and noticed that she was gone. "Aw man," she groaned and turned it off. She sat in the sand, feeling exhausted and guilty. "My dad's going to kill me!" Cleo noticed the owl landing next to her, staring at her with those big eyes. She smiled, despite herself. "Thanks for helping me back there."

"It was the least I could do Cleo," the owl said. Cleo was not the least bit taken aback that it could talk or that it knew her name.

"Have you been following me?" she asked.

"I have," he said with modesty. "You're very lucky I decided to, otherwise, you would be dead now. If I must be blunt with you, what you tried to do back at the hotel was foolish. Unlike yourself, he has a long time of fighting experience. He would have killed you in a minute if he wasn't toying with you."

"He did say 'eons'," Cleo replied. "Just what is he anyway, some kind of vampire?" After seeing him taste her blood with pleasure, she wouldn't have been surprised. Then she remembered the black blood. "Hey, you don't suppose he's a dark interloper do you?"

"I'm not quite sure," the owl said, shrugging his wings. "He is a great mystery to me, this Ghirahim. Never got the chance to see him before now."

"I guess you're right, if you had, he would be in the travel guide. I don't remember ever coming across him in there."

"Oh hoo hoo, so you know that I created the guide, do you? When did you find out?"

"The moment you winked at me on my birthday after my first trip to Hyrule," Cleo said, with a smile. Then that smile was gone the next second. "What is he doing here in Miami anyway? He didn't know I'd be here, so it has to be some other reason. What could he be up to?"

There was a pause, the owl turned his head in every direction not humanly possible as though looking for eavesdroppers. "You're a very brave girl, Cleo, and smart too. It seems to me that you're ready for anything, am I right?"

She looked at him curiously. "Yes."

"Tell me, are you prepared for whatever dangers lie ahead?" the owl asked seriously. Cleo nodded. "Then follow me, I must show you something." He held out his talon. "My name is Kaepora, by the way."

"Yeah, I know." Cleo took his talon and shook it. Kaepora took off and Cleo followed him along the beach. It was still too dark out to see well, so he hooted to her to guide her through the night. After thirty minutes of walking, they came to a rocky cliff stretching out to the ocean and a light house on the shore. Kaepora lead her on to the cobbled cliff, it looked like a wide road that just lead to nowhere. She stopped at the end.

Kaepora landed on her shoulder. "There is something hidden here," he said, pointing to the water with his wing. "Only I know where it is and can summon it." He shook that wing until a stray feather came loose and floated out gently onto the waves. The moment it landed, a bright light began to trace across the surface slowly from the feather. It had formed a spell circle, one that Cleo knew.

"A portal?" She cried, amazed. Sure enough Kaepora recited the incantation in Hylian and something began appearing in a column of light. When the light cleared, Cleo's first thought that someone tall, and feminine was standing with her back to them and was going to turn around to face them any second. But she didn't, she just stood eerily still... like a statue. "Uh, hello?..." Cleo called to her, but there was no response. It was when the beam from the lighthouse roved over them that she realized the woman she was looking at was just a statue, a statue of white marble.

"This, you see before you, is one of the statues of the three goddesses. More specifically Farore, the goddess of courage."

"One of the statues?"

"Yes, indeed. The two other statures were already summoned at their places."

"What places? Where are they?"

"I'll give you all the answers needed, if you'll stop interrupting me." After Cleo said "sorry" a bit sheepishly, he continued. "To answer your question, the other two are on islands called Puerto Rico and... Bermuda."

After a pause, Cleo suddenly came to a conclusion. "The Bermuda Triangle."

"You catch on fast. Yes, there is a connection between the Bermuda Triangle and Hyrule. It is the one major connection that binds your realm with mine. Now listen well Cleo. There is a great portal in the center of this triangle and it was once open to all long ago, longer than man's recorded history. The two realms were peaceful neighbors and the gateway was managed by eight sages. It was an era of a great alliance... until it came to an abrupt end. A plague of evil, it's origin unknown, had spread throughout both worlds until the minds of thousands were driven to war. So the sages were forced to not only close the portal, but to erase it's history from existence. To make sure the portal stayed close, the three statues, that serve as locks to the portal, were removed of their circlets, which are the keys. These circlets were taken across your realm to different places. One is in the far east, one in the dark continent, and one in the old world."

"If I may ask, what does it have to do with Ghirahim?"

"This statue is the reason why he is here. He's looking for it. If you want to defeat him, you must find the circlets and return them to the statues in order to reopen the great portal. Once you do that, you will gain, from within, the tool to overpower him."


*Kids, do not try this at home!