Innermost Fears
[Somewhere near center of Castle Town sits the young Zora Princess, Ruto. She frowns, and clutches a rock, absentmindedly tossing it in her hand, again, and again. She’s not really paying attention to what she’s doing. Her mind is too busy swarming with thoughts.]
[There are many things she truly isn’t sure of anymore. Whether the inhabitants of Hyrule would ever come back, especially the Zora people, was one of the main things she just doesn’t know. She’d assumed in the beginning, it could only be a matter of time before everything was back to normal. But it had been weeks… months… She isn’t sure of how long it has been, either. But it certainly feels like a long time. And with each passing day, it seemed less and less likely anything would ever be the way it was before. She is beginning to accept she may never see the Zoras again. She has felt such pain once. It isn’t anything new.]
[But along with those thoughts are other insecurities, that have been flitting in her mind since days ago, from her conversation with Ganondorf, who is apparently trying to take over Hyrule. She doubts he would succeed. There are so many heroes, so many opponents, she assumes a fool like him wouldn’t ever manage to claim Hyrule as his own.]
[So it isn’t that which is troubling her. It is something less significant, but certainly felt very important to her mind. There is, for one, the revelation she would eventually grow up to be the Sage of the Water Temple. And she knows not exactly what to think of this newfound knowledge. An honor, perhaps, to know she will become something like that. But it is, in a way, unwanted. She never asked to be a sage, nor a princess, nor… anything, really. She was, in truth, not all that fond of such things.]
[Sure, saying you were a princess was a good way to get people to listen to you… but in the end, she‘d felt it had done nothing for her but leave her restricted. In this Hyrule, a land essentially of anarchy, being a princess seems to have less meaning. She is no longer bound by rules that dictated where she could and couldn‘t go, and she truly is grateful for that.]
[So then what will happen to her when she becomes the sage of the Water Temple? Would she again have heavy duties, unwanted responsibilities, restrictions and limitations…? Thinking about it troubles her. However, that information was not the thing Ganondorf had told her that had the biggest impact. Not in the least.]
[‘You are a terrible princess because you are a spoiled little brat. You think everyone else will change to conform to your wishes, even though you have no actual power to force them to. You are self-centered, rude, and no one really likes you.’]
[It’s not the first time she had been called a brat. Nor would it be the last. But it is the first time she has been make to think, to really think, about what she had been called.]
[…Was she really a brat? A spoiled, condescending brat… So many people had called her such things, had looked down on her as a snob who thought she was better, more important than she really was. And always, she had brushed it off. So why now, then? Why was she truly thinking about it now? Because he‘d said she had no friends. That no one liked her. No one… ]
[Back when everything was normal, the way it should have been…As a princess, she’d never had many friends in the first place. It was always royal duties this, royal duties that. There was no one around to befriend her, no one around period. Save for her parents, but one now was gone forever, and she feared the same for the other…]
[And in this version of Hyrule, even still, she doesn’t have many friends. Even still, she feels alone. Did everyone… did they really…]
They don’t hate me. Why would they? I... I haven’t done anything to them…!
[She grabs the small stone tighter, before finally tossing it halfheartedly in the direction of a nearby wall. They… Did they hate her? Did everyone really… hate her? And suddenly, the words, the name calling… it all seems so much worse than it had before. And accompanied with this is a true, very real fear. The fear of being hated. The fear of… being alone.]
[The Zoras are gone. And now she begins to doubt that anyone has ever really liked her at all.]
[To be truly by herself… it is an amazingly frightening thing.]
[There are many things she truly isn’t sure of anymore. Whether the inhabitants of Hyrule would ever come back, especially the Zora people, was one of the main things she just doesn’t know. She’d assumed in the beginning, it could only be a matter of time before everything was back to normal. But it had been weeks… months… She isn’t sure of how long it has been, either. But it certainly feels like a long time. And with each passing day, it seemed less and less likely anything would ever be the way it was before. She is beginning to accept she may never see the Zoras again. She has felt such pain once. It isn’t anything new.]
[But along with those thoughts are other insecurities, that have been flitting in her mind since days ago, from her conversation with Ganondorf, who is apparently trying to take over Hyrule. She doubts he would succeed. There are so many heroes, so many opponents, she assumes a fool like him wouldn’t ever manage to claim Hyrule as his own.]
[So it isn’t that which is troubling her. It is something less significant, but certainly felt very important to her mind. There is, for one, the revelation she would eventually grow up to be the Sage of the Water Temple. And she knows not exactly what to think of this newfound knowledge. An honor, perhaps, to know she will become something like that. But it is, in a way, unwanted. She never asked to be a sage, nor a princess, nor… anything, really. She was, in truth, not all that fond of such things.]
[Sure, saying you were a princess was a good way to get people to listen to you… but in the end, she‘d felt it had done nothing for her but leave her restricted. In this Hyrule, a land essentially of anarchy, being a princess seems to have less meaning. She is no longer bound by rules that dictated where she could and couldn‘t go, and she truly is grateful for that.]
[So then what will happen to her when she becomes the sage of the Water Temple? Would she again have heavy duties, unwanted responsibilities, restrictions and limitations…? Thinking about it troubles her. However, that information was not the thing Ganondorf had told her that had the biggest impact. Not in the least.]
[‘You are a terrible princess because you are a spoiled little brat. You think everyone else will change to conform to your wishes, even though you have no actual power to force them to. You are self-centered, rude, and no one really likes you.’]
[It’s not the first time she had been called a brat. Nor would it be the last. But it is the first time she has been make to think, to really think, about what she had been called.]
[…Was she really a brat? A spoiled, condescending brat… So many people had called her such things, had looked down on her as a snob who thought she was better, more important than she really was. And always, she had brushed it off. So why now, then? Why was she truly thinking about it now? Because he‘d said she had no friends. That no one liked her. No one… ]
[Back when everything was normal, the way it should have been…As a princess, she’d never had many friends in the first place. It was always royal duties this, royal duties that. There was no one around to befriend her, no one around period. Save for her parents, but one now was gone forever, and she feared the same for the other…]
[And in this version of Hyrule, even still, she doesn’t have many friends. Even still, she feels alone. Did everyone… did they really…]
They don’t hate me. Why would they? I... I haven’t done anything to them…!
[She grabs the small stone tighter, before finally tossing it halfheartedly in the direction of a nearby wall. They… Did they hate her? Did everyone really… hate her? And suddenly, the words, the name calling… it all seems so much worse than it had before. And accompanied with this is a true, very real fear. The fear of being hated. The fear of… being alone.]
[The Zoras are gone. And now she begins to doubt that anyone has ever really liked her at all.]
[To be truly by herself… it is an amazingly frightening thing.]