//------------------------------// // Mirrored Perspectives // Story: Linked by Fate // by Greatazuredragon //------------------------------// Mirrored Perspectives A young-looking woman wearing a regal dress with purple accents stood right next to an equally young-looking man wearing what looked like purple robes. Purple robes that, for some reason, seemed to incorporate a hoodie with long purple bunny ears. Both of them were standing at the edge of the woods with a highway that led to a city in the distance. They stood there in perfect silence for a long moment. Their keen eyes took in the sight before them with a respectable amount of surprise, amazement, and confusion. Then, the purple-haired woman finally broke the silence by addressing her companion. “Ravio, this is not Lorule,” the woman commented faux-casually towards her companion, her long dark-purple hair swaying upon the evening wind as she slowly took in their new surroundings. Her voice was calm and collected as if nothing could possibly be wrong. Though the very faint twitch upon her brow betrayed her true feelings. “Yes, your highness,” the young man wearing the light purple robes immediately replied with a small grimace. His head moved from side to side as his eyes frantically analyzed this strange new place, trying to understand what could’ve possibly happened. The bunny ears atop his hoodie wriggled from side to side with each movement of his head. “Nor is this Hyrule, or any of the known realms, for that matter,” Princess Hilda continued in the faux-calm tone of voice that Ravio knew from personal experience heralded nothing good in both the short and long term for his continued well being. The slow tightening of the princess’ hands into fists only reinforced that notion. “I have noticed, your highness,” the young man replied, feeling the shadows of the cowardice that Link had helped him conquer trying to rise up once again. Taking a deep breath, he mustered his resolve and beat such feelings down once again. It had been several years since Link and Zelda had saved Lorule by reviving their Triforce. And during those years he had stalwartly stood by Princess Hilda’s side, helping her to rebuild their country. Sure, he had felt like running away dozens of times during that time period. But he hadn’t! And that was what counted! “The horseless metal chariots made that very clear.” “Quite,” Hilda blithely replied as they both watched one of said horseless metal chariots pass by with impressive speed, using a strangely smooth stone road to leave the forested area they were currently in as it went towards a truly massive city in the distance. A very odd massive city. With an abundance of very tall, strangely square buildings that seemed to be made of brick and glass more than anything else. The fact that not even a single stone or wood building was in sight only added to the overall oddness of everything. “So, my dear friend, would you care to tell me what exactly you have done to get us here?” “I didn’t do anything, your highness!” Ravio rushed to affirm, the fact that the princess’ eye twitch had become even more pronounced as she asked the question showing that he had to defuse things fast, lest the growing storm be unleashed on him of all people! “I swear, I had no part in whatever it was that brought us here! Why would you even think that?” “Why indeed?” Hilda asked in a far too sweet tone of voice for the cowardly hero’s peace of mind as she turned to look at him fully. The smile upon her features did not reach her eyes in the slightest. “I mean, it’s not like you have the habit of collecting weird and powerful magical artifacts, some of which you barely understand their function, or origin. “Nor do you have the hobby of poking and probing at any dimensional tear you happen to stumble upon to see what’s on the other side. Why, perish the thought!” she continued in the same far too sweet tone of voice as she started to walk towards him. The fact that she was unarmed while Ravio was carrying a veritable arsenal of magical artifacts on his person did very little to boost the bunny-eared man’s confidence. “It’s not like you have caused us to go to at least two other realms in the years we have known each other due to said prodding, and that’s excluding Hyrule, after all! Why would I even think that you could have somehow caused this current mishap, I wonder?” Grimacing slightly, Ravio had to admit that, when put that way, Princess Hilda’s suspicions did indeed have some merit. But, still! It was not like anything bad had come out of him doing those things! Sure, Termina had been odd, but not a bad kind of odd! And the princess of the Twili had been extremely understanding of them dropping in the middle of her throne room! Even if she did threaten them with bloody murder at the start of the whole fiasco until they managed to convince her they weren’t the tip of an invasion force or something of the like. Everything had turned out alright in the end! No need to keep bringing it up! And he hadn’t lost control of any of his magical artifacts or experiments in quite some time! Easily more than five months! So that was also another thing that there was no need for the princess to get all hung up with! But considering her, far too wide, smile as she kept approaching him, Ravio decided that bringing that up probably wasn’t the wisest of ideas right now. “Okay, normally you would have a point, your highness, I concede that!” Ravio said with a small brittle smile while slowly starting to walk backwards, both hands raised in front of him in a placating manner as he tried to calm his liege down a little so she could understand his innocence in this particular scenario. “But I assure you, this time I had nothing to do with it! There is simply no way that my current experiments could have caused an accidental dimensional breach and transported us here!” “They couldn’t have caused an ‘accidental’ dimensional breach?” Hilda put a very definite emphasis on the word ‘accidental’ as she asked her question, making Ravio gulp as a shiver went down his spine. “Poor word choice, your highness, that’s all!” he hurriedly reassured the princess of Lorule. And he was speaking nothing but the truth, too! He had no idea how they had ended up in this new dimension, but his current experiment most certainly couldn’t have caused said displacement! At least, he thought so… probably… best not to add that bit to his explanation though. “It simply couldn’t have caused a dimensional breach! Period!” As Princess Hilda stopped her advance in order to close her eyes and take a long deep breath, Ravio felt himself relaxing slightly. If she at least gave him a chance to explain himself, then he surely could prove his innocence! “Very well, if that is the case, then what exactly had you been playing with this time, Ravio?” Hilda asked after a few more deep breaths as the twitch upon her eyebrow noticeably lessened. Relaxing even more, Ravio thanked the Triforce for his good luck. Lowering his hands he gave his long-time friend a smile and started to explain about the exciting new discovery he had been researching before this unexpected development had yanked them out of Lorule. “Well, Rosso may have had an amazing new idea pertaining to a new type of high yield combustible mixture that could be used as a mining implement, and-“ “You were experimenting with explosives in the castle?! After what happened last time?!” his now very distressed sounding liege shouted, cutting him off. All the calm she had regained was apparently tossed to the wind as she gave him an admonishing glare. “Oh, c’mon! It was only once, and it was an honest mistake! It could’ve happened to anybody! And I took all the necessary precautions this time!” he quickly justified his actions, even as he once again started to backpedal as Hilda once again started to purposefully approach him. The very worrying twitch was back with full force upon her brow. “You collapsed the entire northern tower last time!” she shouted as his back hit a tree, blocking his avenue of retreat. “Need I remind you of that?! Why would you think that’s a good idea I-” And as his long-time friend and lady liege ranted at him about his, somewhat questionable, research practices, he couldn’t help but let out a near-silent sigh. While the sun in this new land slowly started to set and Hilda’s rant showed no sign of slowing down, Ravio decided it was going to be a long night. Leaning against a balcony of one of the many buildings that made up Canterlot City, three youthful-looking girls stared with very interested eyes towards the faraway woods that surrounded the bustling city. But, despite the fact that outwardly they looked no older than teenagers, the very intent light shining upon each of their gazes’ betrayed their real age, as they focused solely upon what they had felt but moments ago. “Did you feel that, sisters?” the golden-haired leader of the group asked her two companions, one hand idly playing with the red gem hanging around her neck as she kept gazing at the faraway woods. “But of course, Adagio! That was a lot of magic!” Sonata happily pointed out. The blue-haired siren was all but jumping in place as she leaned dangerously close to the edge of the balcony, as if doing so would get her closer to whatever it was that had caused the magical surge. “And I do mean a LOT of magic!” “Yes, but it was not Equestrian magic,” Aria pointed out with narrowed eyes. All the while the purple-haired siren absently grabbed the back of her excitable sister and dragged her away from the balcony’s edge. “Whatever this is, it’s something else entirely, something… new.” “Yes, you are quite right. But, regardless of its origin, it’s magic nonetheless,” the golden-haired siren all but purred, a very hungry look entering her eyes as a fanged smile surfaced upon her features. “Pure magic, and plenty of it at that. Far more than anything this pathetic planet has ever managed to produce through all these long years of our banishment.” The blonde-haired siren stared at the woods for several more moments; her mind awhirl with possibilities, before a predatory smile slowly surfaced upon her features, a smile that was soon mirrored by her two sisters at her side. Adagio didn’t need to voice what she was thinking, for she knew Sonata and Aria were thinking the exact same thing. Whatever it was that had just unceremoniously entered this sorry excuse of a planet, this magical-dead-zone they had been entrapped within by that doddering old fool of a unicorn, could very well be the key for their escape. For centuries they had been forced to be extremely frugal with the use of their powers. Husbanding every little drop of magic they managed to get their hands upon due to its sheer scarcity in this realm. The negative energies they could extract from the magicless human beings were barely enough to sate their hunger and sustain them during these long miserable years. Any expenditure of magic had to be carefully considered, lest they use more than they could recover and find themselves weaker in the end. But this, this new development, this changed everything! This unknown was emanating enough magic to sustain them for centuries! More than enough to not only raise them back to the heights of power they had experienced back on Equestria. Back before that cursed meddling old fool had banished them! Power to far surpass their past glory! To raise them to new undreamed heights! If they could acquire this source of magic they could conquer this pathetic dustball of a planet and crush it under their heels! They could shatter the pathetic barrier keeping them here and return to Equestria so that they could unleash their vengeance upon the foolish ponies that had dared to banish them! They could do all that and more! “Well, sisters, I hope you didn’t have any pressing plans for tonight,” Adagio all but purred. Her toothy smile was something that would have made her original predatory form proud. Sheer hunger was clear in her gaze as her eyes never strayed from the faraway woods where her prey now dwelled. “Because it’s time to go hunting.”