"The Guardian's Arrival"

Far away from Hyrule, in a vast room filled with people, an alarm blared. "Dimensional rip!" someone yelled.

A man wearing a brown cloak and two swords came rushing to the man who had spoken. "Where?" he asked.

"Sub-dimension 10274," the worker replied.

The man in the cloak frowned. "Nothing there except-wait. Did you say 10274?"

"Yes."

"Link's in danger! And he's crucial according to what the Sisters say. Get me there, now!"

Link drew his sword and broke down the door to find three men in black suits. One of them held Zelda and a crossbow. The others carried longswords.

The ones with swords began to advance, so Link put away the Master Sword, drew his bow, and notched an arrow. "Don't make me fire." But the two men just laughed and continued to walk. Link shrugged and loosed his arrow at one of the intruders, but it bounced right off. Link stared at the splintered arrow, then at the assassins.

Then a jagged rip appeared in the ceiling. He looked through, expecting to see the Hyrulian sky. But instead he saw an endless abyss. Then, three more ninjas dropped in through the rip, and it resealed itself. Link was seriously outnumbered. But then yet another portal opened, and a man in a cloak dropped out. "Release Zelda and face me! " he thundered. Who's this guy? Link thought, And does he have a suicide wish?

This day was changing rapidly from good to strange. The ninjas whirled around and lunged, but stopped in mid-leap once they saw the swords flash into the hands of the stranger. Then the man lunged, swords cutting gashes out of them. He handled his swords like sabres, flicking them out like whips. Finally, he tired of this game and ran two of the assassins through. Their bodies disappeared in a flash of blue fire, which Link remembered was the usual way of death of Ganondorf's men, then the stranger repeated the process on the all of them except the one who held Zelda. He stopped in front of him. "Let her go now, or else. Surely you recognize me, so you know I can destroy you."

The assassin looked about wildly, shoved the princess away and snarled, " My master will kill you. It's not over yet!" and then he disappeared.
 
 

"Who are you?" asked Link. But the man did not answer. He looked lost in thought.

Then Saria entered, looking scared. "Wha- what happened and who is that?"

"Assassins, and this guy stopped them," answered Link.

"Who is he?"

"He won't tell me."

Then the man spoke, but only to himself, "A rip? Here? And caused by Ganon? It's impossible!"

Link decided the man must be almost deaf, so he yelled loudly in the stranger's ear. "Who are you?"

This got a reaction. The man did a little dance while holding his ears. "Ow! I can hear, Link. Don't talk so loud."

He wasn't in the mood for long conversations, so he decided to ask all his questions at once. "What is your name, how do you know my name, who were those people, and where did you come from?" demanded Link.

The man smiled. "That's quite a few questions, but I guess you do deserve some answers. First of all, my name is Dragoncloud, but I prefer Cloud. Secondly, I know all about you, Zelda, Saria, and most everyone in Hyrule thanks to a certain spy, who will remain nameless, with abilities to help him look everywhere. Those people were assassins who were sent, best I can tell, by Ganondorf, don't ask me how. Lastly, I'm from Dimension Z, sent here because we detected a dimensional rip.

"Dimension?"

"There is a dimension for every letter of the alphabet, like Dimension A through Dimension Z, and many sub-dimensions, which have two letters in their name, or simply numbers." He waved an arm to imply all of Hyrule. "You are currently standing in sub-dimension 10274."

"You said Ganondorf sent those men after us. But we banished him." Zelda spoke up. Link was rather suprised. He had always thought that all people except the Sages had forgotten the alternate future. But now that he thought about it, Zelda was a Sage.

"Good question, but your guess is as good as mine. The only technology I know of that can open a rip was made in my world. We already had dimensional transversing, but only for one at a time. Project Z, as we called it, would send large armies right in front of our enemy's walls, but it was sent to a special realm, for it was too dangerous for normal humans, so only I could use it."

"Two more questions," said Link. "First, what was that armor those men were wearing made from?"

"Mithral. A mystic metal in my realm."

"Your realm?"

"Yes. I rule Dimension Z. Next question."

"You said normal humans couldn' t use this.ripper or whatever, but you could."

"Yes," Cloud sighed. " You see, I'm a cyborg."

"Huh?"

"Robotic."

"What?" Link was really confused now.

"I'm made out of metal."

"All of you? Why? What happened?"

Cloud smiled sadly. "Someday I'll tell you that story. Listen, I need to go home to get some things. I'll be back soon."

"Why are you coming back?" asked Saria.

Cloud shrugged. "You need a guard that can defend you from these assassins. Your Hyrule guards are fine soldiers I'm sure, but you saw how much good that arrow did, so I'm signing up. Oh by the way, do you have any empty quarters near here?"

"Yes." replied Zelda.

"Very well," then Cloud frowned. "How did Ganondorf get ahold of Project Z?" he said mostly to himself.

"Beats me," answered Link. "We sent him to the Evil Realm."

Cloud looked sharply at him. "Evil Realm?"

Then he slowly sunk his head into his hands. "Oh no. I don't believe it. That's where we sent Project Z."

"You're kidding."

"Nope. Ganon is free once more, and those assassins were his henchmen. Well, I'm leaving. See you when I get back." And with that he disappeared into the portal.
 

A dark figure sat on a large throne. And his name was Ganondorf. He was free, free from that awful place! He began thinking about what his assassins were doing to Link and Zelda. He'd instructed them to make their deaths slow and painful. Just then a figure dressed in black shuffled in through the door, and knelt. Ganondorf recognized him as the leader of the assassins he had sent after Link. "Ah, my loyal minion. Good news?"

"Lord Ganondorf, I've failed!" cried the assassin.

Ganondorf was stunned. "That is impossible! I gave you Mithral armor!"

"Dra.Dragoncloud attacked us! I'm the only one who escaped."

"You're sure it was Dragoncloud?"

"Yes! He was 500 feet tall and had-"

"Silence!" Ganondorf cut off his lies. "So he's taken up guarding the royal family.His realm is much too powerful to attack, but here, he is weaker.I know just the one to combat him.Dragoncloud's old friend."
 

Link sat in Zelda's living room. He was still shaken by that attack, and endless questions plagued his mind. Should he stop the wedding until Ganondorf was gone once more? Or should the wedding continue, and he just send Cloud to defeat Ganondorf? His thoughts were interrupted by a flash of light and Cloud, along with a woman, dropped through the ceiling. "Hello," said Cloud. "I'd like you to meet Sarah, leader of the Sisters."

Just then Zelda walked in. "Who are the Sisters?" she asked.

"A group from my dimension much like your sages. I'd like to see the living quarters now."

"Do you want one suite or two?" asked Zelda.

"Two," Cloud replied.

"Not married, I take it?" Zelda inquired slyly.

"No," sighed Sarah. Then she gave Cloud an evil smile.

"Not yet anyways."

Cloud paled. "Uh, yes. Well? Where are our quarters?"

"Just down the hall," replied Zelda. Then she eyed the bag slung on his shoulder. "What's that?"

"Just some tools. I can't live without certain items, which I just might sell and make a handy profit. By the way, what do you use for money?"

"Rupees," replied Link.

"Very well. It looks like I'll be staying here for quite a while, so I'd better go settle in. See you later." Cloud walked out of the room.