Seven Years part 15.5

No comment... I will say though that I think this is one of the best sections so far

Toran darted into Gordon City using as much stealth as his quick pace could afford. So far the massive cavern that severed as the home for the entire Gordon race seemed completely empty. Normally one couldn’t walk ten paces into the city before been hoarded by a gang of Gordons asking about the latest news and offering massive hugs.

The second level of the cavern was as empty as the first, and the third was similarly uninhabited. However, as he walked around the ledge overlooking the fourth and bottom floor, Toran heard voices floating up through the cave.

“Where is he?” the harsh question was followed by the sound of a whip cracking harshly. It was the same voice that Toran had heard outside the team’s hideout: the Dark Knuckle. The whip crack was punctuated by the scream of a Gordon, obviously a young child from the sound of its voice. Toran felt his blood run hot at the idea of a child been beaten. It had happened many times in his rough childhood, and he had long ago promised he would never let someone harm a child in his presence.

Placing his hands on the railing around the drop to the lower floor, Toran quick vaulted the fence and dropped to the basement. Glancing around quickly, he saw a small Gordon child curled into a ball in one corner of the room. A Lizardman was standing over him holding cruel whip, and the Dark Knuckle stood slightly to the left, arms crossed over its chest. In addition to the three living people in the room, the floor was scattered with the bodied of Gannondorf’s minions, members of Plarth’s team, and a few Gordon corpses. Obviously the final and most heated parts of the battle had happened in the lower levels.

“Hey, Lizardface, why don’t you pick on someone who can actually fight back,” Toran challenged, striding forward. Both heads jerked around, and a deep rumble of a laugh flowed from the Dark Knuckle.

“Kill the fool,” the large knight sneered, jerking its head towards Toran. The Lizardman gave a loud cry and leapt at Toran, slashing out with its short sword. Toran easily dodged the stroke, ducking to his left to avoid the blade. He quickly shot out his right foot, connecting with the Lizardman’s unguarded side. The Lizardman stumbled off balance, giving Toran the opportunity he wanted. Drawing his Katana and whirling, Toran put the force of his spin into a vicious slash. In response to the Lizardman’s shriek of pain, Toran reversed motion and brought his sword up in a counter slash. There was a tug on his sword arm as the minion slid off the blade to ground, spilling black blood onto the floor.

“I figured as much…” the Dark Knuckle commented, grabbing the handle of its long axe, and swinging it above its head, “I wondered how long it would be before this happened.”

Toran readied his katana and took a cautious step back, falling into his normal stance. The Dark Knuckle was whirling the massive axe around his head and body as though it were a toothpick. It began to slowly but steadily advance, keeping its axe in constant motion.

Toran felt like cursing. His massive opponent was not only strong and fast, but apparently well trained and very practiced. Plan, plan, plan… need a freaking good plan NOW… ran through his head as he backed up, trying to keep space between himself and the whirling axe. He knew he was faster, and had a lighter weapon, both of which hypothetically gave him an edge. But as he watched the large deadly black axe whipping around with bone-crunching power, he wondered just how much stock he placed in his speed. Toran felt the wall against his back. Realizing he had just run out of room, Toran kicked his mind into overdrive. Rushing at the Dark Knuckle, Toran ducked at the last second, feeling the axe cut through the air just inches above his head in a powerful level sweep. He was too close to slash, but lunging up Toran drove his shoulder into the knight’s lower chest. The heavy armor absorbed the blow, but it did cause the Dark Knuckle to stumble backwards a pace or two. Toran pressed his slight advantage, giving a quick stroke with his katana, aimed for the knight’s midsection.

The blow never hit the target.

The big knight must have seen the move coming, because he moved the pole of his axe perfectly blocking fast stroke. Driving his knee quickly upwards, the Dark Knuckle connected squarely with Toran’s now unprotected stomach. Swinging its axe around quickly, it clubbed Toran right in the jaw with the haft of its axe, sending him flying backwards. Toran hit the ground and skid for several feet. Cursing he pushed himself onto his elbows shacking his head quickly to clear it. Bounding up, he tired a different approach that had worked against Moblins for him in the past. The Dark Knuckle was obviously faster and a better fighter then any Moblin, but he still was relying on power to win the fight.

It took exactly four strokes on Toran’s part to realize the new attack wasn’t going to work either. Two parries and another axe haft to the jaw later, Toran found himself in the exact same position, standing dazedly up after a vicious knock-back. It was as though the Dark Knuckle knew his combat style and every move like he had trained for it everyday. All of Toran carefully trained strokes were blocked as though he telegraphed them three moves in advance. Rolling to his feet for a forth time, Toran began to from a new strategy. How could he grab the Gordon child and get out of the cave before the Dark Knuckle killed both of them?

And it was then, thinking about the terrain rather then his opponent, that Toran saw the Dark Knuckle’s mistake.

It wasn’t even a real mistake. The Dark Knuckle was standing close to the wall, axe level in front of him, ready for Toran’s next attack. It was then that Toran noticed the two bomb flowers growing on the wall to either side of his big opponent. Bomb flowers were not as powerful as the refined bombs the Gordons turned them into, but they still produced quite a blast. Reversing his grip on the katana, Toran quickly threw it at the bomb flower closer to the Dark Knuckle. It jerked back, and looked surprised for the first time in the fight; obviously, it had not expected Toran to throw his weapon. It ducked to the left to avoid the blade, but failed to see that it had not been the target for the throw.

The explosion that followed soon enlightened it.

Toran saw the whole seen in an odd slow-motion sort of way. Fire exploding from the bomb, the force of the blast knocking the Dark Knuckle through the air and skidding across the floor. The way it ripped the breastplate and right arm guards right off his body, the way the helmet blew off causing its dark lank hair to fly around. The whole scene took an eternity to unfold. Grabbing the fallen Lizardman’s short sword, Toran walked towards the fallen Dark Knuckle. It had pushed itself to one knee, back towards him, and Toran could see it shaking its dark haired head in confusion. Then the knight twisted to look over its shoulder at him, and Toran’s heart froze.

Sweat and dirt caked the face, blood tricked from the sharp nose, and there was an uncharacteristically confused look in the steely grey eyes, but it was still obviously him.

“Toran?”

Now that he saw the face, Toran remembered where he had heard the voice before. He had heard it every day of his life for almost ten years. Small wonder the Dark Knuckle had known his every move; he had witnessed Toran train for nearly half a decade.

“Toran! What’s wrong? Where the hell is Shiek?”

Toran felt the sword slip from his nerveless grasp. Everything in his body and mind seemed to shut off.

“Toran? What is going on here?”

What was going on here? Seemingly back from the dead and helping to slaughter an entire race was none other then fearless warrior for good and protector of the innocent, Draq; moreover, he didn’t seem to have a clue as to anything that was happening.

“Draq, look at yourself…” Toran was finally able get out.

Draq glanced down at the massive steel gauntlet on his hand and started. As he looked at the rest of his Knuckle armor, a strange panicked look came into his grey eyes. Sitting back onto his legs, Draq stared down at his hands, and Toran could have sworn he saw tears in the big axe-man’s eyes.

“N-no… oh Narue, anything but this…” Draq breathed. His grey eyes looked pleadingly up at Toran, a strange desperation in his voice, “Please, Toran, what happened?”

“I, uh, have no idea… Last time anyone saw you, you were saving Shiek’s life outside the Forest Temple from the Phantom Gannondorf. We all thought you had died…”

A look somewhat like someone coming out of a deep sleep crept into Draq’s eyes, like he was remembering something buried deep in his mind.

“I threw Shiek out of the courtyard…” he began, speaking slowly as the images came back to him, “I remember I was going to try to slow down the thing and let her escape… I fought it for a little bit, but it wasn’t long before I took a blast to chest. I remember it burned worse then anything. I went down, but it didn’t kill me… No, it was those two witches who raised Gannondorf, the Greudo ones, they were there…” his voice trailed off, realization suddenly burning in his eyes.

“What?” asked Toran, already guessing the answer, “What did they do to you?”

Draq didn’t respond. Rising to his feet, he walked over to the wall where the remaining bomb flower was growing. All color had drained from his face, and his eyes held immense pain.

“Draq!” exclaimed Toran, becoming worried, “what are you doing?”

“They did something to me, Toran…” his head drooped, his icy eyes falling to the ground, “they put me in that suit, and I couldn’t control myself anymore. I did whatever they wanted…” his face lifted to look back into Toran’s, pain still etched on his sharp features, “they took me back to the courtyard and I killed…” his voice trailed off, head drooping again. Toran realized where this was going; Draq had been under some form of mind control, and had butchered his own brother while in that state. It would no doubt be a terrible realization for anyone to have, but for the protective minded warrior devastating. Instantly Toran got a flash of what Draq’s plan was. Straightening, Draq clinched his armored fist and glared at the bomb flower, confirming Toran’s fear. At that range without protection, the blast would undoubtedly kill Draq.

“Draq! No! You can’t do that!” Toran cried, extending his hand as he took a step closer.

“Back away Toran, I don’t want the blast to kill you,” Draq barked, a look of complete loss in his eyes.

“You won’t kill me Draq, you’re not like that!” Toran protested, taking another step towards Draq.

“I’m not? I almost did it just a few seconds ago, and I chopped my brother into fish bait! Don’t think I won’t do it!”

“That wasn’t you Draq; it was Gannondorf using your body… come on, we need you. Keef betrayed us, Plarth’s team is gone… if you blow us up here then it’s just Shiek and Impa! You can’t do this!”

Toran could see the battle in Draq’s eyes, but he really doubted Draq had it in him to kill the two of them. Draq stared back at him for a moment, when suddenly burning rage flared into his grey eyes. Screaming in frustration, Draq’s arm lashed out to the wall. For one awful moment, Toran knew he was going to die. Closing his eyes Toran waited for the blast to envelop him. He saw the image of Shiek sitting in the cave flicking her bangs.

Goddess, I swear if I ever see her again I’m gonn’a kiss first and ask permission later…

He heard a vicious crack, but the blast never followed. Opening his eyes, Torn saw Draq shaking with emotion, his clenched fist smashed against the wall just inches from the flower.

“I’m not going back Toran,” Draq said, letting his arm fall to his side, “I couldn’t face any of them…”

“Where will you go?” Toran asked, realizing there was no way to make Draq stay if he felt he had to go. Toran held his surprise in check as he saw the first tear he had ever seen fall from Draq’s eye trickle slowly down the outside of his face.

“I don’t know… I have to leave Hyrule. But first I am going into the Fire Temple and fixing at least some of the damage I did. And no Toran,” he finished, cutting off Toran before he even had a chance to speak, “you are not coming with me.”

Toran made to protest, but Draq waved a dismissive hand.

“Don’t start kid, I made this mess, and I’m going to clean it up. Besides, you know as well as I do that nine out of ten people never make it out of a temple they walk into, and you have a princess to win.”

Toran started, surprise in his eyes.

“You knew Shiek was a princess?”

“I was speaking metaphorically,” Draq shrugged, “but it doesn’t surprise me to find out she’s some kind of Shiekah princess… You were a wonderful comrade Toran, please don’t tell Shiek and Malon about this. It’s better they think I’m dead…”

Toran made to protest a second time, but Draq was already running into the Gordon City throne room and the secret entrance to the Fire temple. Feeling tears form in his own eyes, the young warrior turned to go his way. He had a feeling he would not see Draq again for a very long time; not until the tall warrior felt he had redeemed himself for what he had done.

He could only hope they would cross paths again.