Chapter 4 - First Impressions

Chapter 4: First impressions

Artemis, Butler and Holly (unshielded now) re-appeared in a room with a small green diamond to their left, and a small set of stairs in front of them, leading off to a left passageway.
Holly patted herself over to make sure she was…well, whole. She let out a sigh of relief.
“We all made it through safe and sound, who knew?” She said with a smile, until she realised Artemis and Butler were looking at something behind her. Artemis’ face was whiter than usual, and Butler’s contained a look of panic, which is something you would rarely see on his face.
“We aren’t exactly safe yet, Captain Short.” Artemis said to her, his voice shaking, his eyes still staring intently at whatever it was behind her.
Holly slowly turned around. And she saw…a pillar. A single white pillar, slightly taller than Butler, and with a smallish sized circle in the middle of the side of the head.
“Is that what your so scared…” Holly began, but then trailed off as that circle went from black to blood red.
“This can’t be good…” Holly whispered to herself.
Things happened rather fast after that.
The second a laser began to descend from that circle, Butler jumped in front of Artemis and holly, Holly fainted, Artemis’ face got even paler and when all hope seemed lost, a millisecond before the laser hit them, an arrow whizzed over Butler’s head and landed a dead hit in the middle of the ‘eye’ of the pillar, stopping the laser instantly. Holly didn’t even have time to hit the floor.
Artemis turned quickly on his heel to look at the newcomer, or newcomers, but Butler that had now jumped in front of Artemis yet again, to protect him from this armed individual, or possible group, blocked his vision.
Artemis couldn’t see anything of the new being, but he heard another arrow being strung quick as lightning onto a bow. He could guess where it was pointing.
“Who are you people?” A male voice demanded, supposedly the voice of the newcomer.
Butler said nothing as his eyes scanned their ‘saviour’; the boy that stood in front of him.
The boy wore a green tunic with a long green pointed hat. He had sandy blond hair and a slightly muscular build. Many items were attached to his belt including a slingshot, a boomerang and a lantern. He wore a shield on his arm, and there was most likely a quiver full of arrows strung on his back. Butler could also see the handle of a sword just visible above the boy’s head, so he also carried a rather long (long to the boy anyway) sword. The boy’s weapon of choice was a bow, and an arrow was already strung. It was pointing directly between Butler’s eyes. Talking of which, the boy’s diamond-grey eyes had moved now into slits, showing hatred for Butler.
“Explain yourselves!” The boy yelled, but yet again in Ordion (yes, I think I made up that language. Seeing as Link comes from Ordona, he speaks Ordion), not removing his eyes from Butler; not even to blink, unknowing Butler and Artemis couldn’t speak or understand Ordion.
“Butler, let me talk to him.” Artemis said calmly.
“Artemis, he could be dangerous-“ Butler began, but was silenced by Artemis’ simple raise of a hand.
“Do not worry old friend; if he was unreasonable or wanted to kill us we would be dead by now.”
As Butler could not think of a suitable retort he reluctantly stepped aside.
Artemis, like Butler had, scanned the boy over with his eyes, but picked up on something Butler hadn’t:
The boy had pointed ears.
“Are you a fairy?” Artemis said in perfect gnommish.
The flash of confusion that had appeared on the boy-in-green’s face for merely a second had been enough for Artemis to know the boy didn’t know gnommish.
The boy-in-green was still pointing the bow at Butler’s head, knowing that if the strange, pale and thin almost-Ordon being that stood in front of him tried to invoke any damage, he would just use his sword to stop him. But the giant Goron-like creature was more likely to try to hurt him.
Artemis was clueless in what to do, which was a rare occasion for him. As Artemis pondered about what the feeling was like, the boy-in-green saw out of the corner of his eye that there was another being; possibly Ordon judging by the pointed ears and likeliness to him in appearance; lying on the floor.
Still not removing his eyes from Butler’s, he motioned towards Holly with his head, and asked, this time in the Goron’s language:
“Her? Is she alright?”
The sound was enough to tear Artemis from his thoughts, and by chance his attention was directed to Holly.
Artemis face turned to panic as he realised Holly’s current state, and he fell to his knees beside her.
“Captain Short? Captain! Holly! Holly, wake up! Say something!” Artemis yelled, his voice panic-filled, his face even paler than it had been earlier. For a moment he was just an ordinary teenager, worried for his friend’s health.
Butler moved slowly towards Holly, his eyes staying on the boy-in-green, before they moved to look at Holly as he knelt beside Artemis, resting a hand on Artemis’ shoulder.
Butler’s attention was then brought back to the boy-in-green, because he had moved towards Holly. Butler immediately pulled out his Sig Sauer, still kneeling, his finger on the trigger, the gun pointed at the boy.
“Calm down!” The boy yelled at Butler, stopping his movement. He had once again spoke in Goron, because he was talking to Butler.
They stayed in this position for a matter of moments, until the boy-in-green spoke, breaking the almost-silence:
“I won’t hurt her, promise.” The boy said as he slowly lowered his weapon and relaxed his arms.
“I’ll drop my weapons if you drop that…thing.” The boy said, his eyes not moving from Butler for a second.
The boy dropped his bow, put the arrow back in the quiver and removed his belt, sword and shield as Butler realised what the boy was doing and re-holstered his gun.
The boy removed something from the belt and Butler yelled at him;
“Show me what that is!” meaning the thing the boy had removed.
The boy-in-green brought out the item into full view (even though he can’t speak English, he could guess what Butler wanted), for Butler to see it was a bottle containing red liquid.
“Red potion. To make her better.” The boy said, before unscrewing it and taking a sip for the Goron creature to see it was safe.
Butler grunted as a sign of permission, and hoped he wasn’t making a bad decision.
The boy-in-green, now knowing that he had approval, moved towards Holly and dropped to his knees beside her. He poured half the bottle down her throat then re-screwed the lid and waited.
After a few seconds Holly’s eyes began to flutter, then quickly snapped open and she threw herself up to her feet.
“What happened?” Holly demanded, her face red with embarrassment.
Artemis, at the time Holly had awoke, had quickly wiped away a tear that had been on his face and composed himself and it seemed as if the emotional moment had never happened, and Butler would take that secret to the grave as he knew Artemis would want him to.
“Well,” Artemis began, “We were attacked by a giant white pillar that me and Butler knew of, on account we had read about the different kind of obstacles we would encounter. Anyway, it was at this point you fainted and this boy saved us with his archery skills. He then fed you a red liquid-“
“Red potion.” The boy-in-green cut in.
“Um, yes. Then you awoke and here we are.” Artemis finished, still wondering what language the boy-in-green was speaking.
“So who is this guy?” Holly asked, and received her answer from the boy himself.
“Link. My name’s Link.” The boy smiled as he answered Holly. He wasn’t speaking English, but Holly could understand him anyway (her gift of tongues). Link remained smiling at Holly for a moment, as if he was mesmerised, but then snapped back to reality when he realised he was sitting in a room with complete strangers, was unarmed and they most likely had weapons themselves.
He back-flipped towards his weapons, landing in a role, grabbing his stuff and stylishly attaching them while in the short role, landing crouched, bow poised, an arrow strung and yet again it was pointing at Butler’s head.
“Now.” Link said, back to his old demanding tone of voice, “Explain how you got here, and why.”

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