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The second time it happens is when he picks up his very first sword.
Lights flash around him, the world spins dizzy, and when he opens his eyes the world around him has shifted. He’s taller again. The scarf is missing from his neck. Instead, it’s on the lap of another boy, who’s awkwardly close to his face. About his age, probably, if a little older. Well, his age now, not his age now . About nineteen. Link’s holding a needle, and his other hand is braced on the side of the boy’s head. There’s a pair of earrings in a bedpan beside the pair. Context clues! He totally knows what’s going on.
“Please proceed with haste,” the boy whines, squeezing his eyes shut tighter.
“I am,” Link snips back. He takes a deep breath, noting how these hands stay steady when his would definitely shake. “Okay. Here I go.”
There’s a mark on the boy’s ear, and Link stretches the skin around it taut, pushing the needle through before he can think about it. He had pierced his own ears, and it’s not unlike that. Just on another person. Whom he doesn’t know. If it goes poorly, at least it’s a Future Link problem. The boy breathes in sharply, and before he can pull away, Link pulls the needle back out and inserts the earring instead.
“Wasn’t so bad,” Link says, both to the boy and himself.
“I suppose not,” the boy says, chewing on his lip. “Pierce the other.”
“Please?” Ugh, he hates the way that just came out of his mouth. All Dad-like.
The boy sighs, forcing the tension out of his shoulders. “Please. Legend mustn’t know the uneven appearance spawned from cowardliness.”
“Guess not.” Link turns the boy’s head, doing this side without any of the hesitation.
This time, the boy cries out, a little yelp of pain. Link leans back, tossing the needle into the bedpan. The piercings are even, and really, that’s all he could ask for. “You look good!”
“Yeah?” The boy smiles. “Supposed the alterations will catch the affections of my lady, Sun? Wild discusses the sharing of jewelry with Flora, the frequency of which, I shall admit, flames my jealousy.”
“Um, sure.” He doesn’t know who those people are, but it seems to be the right answer. “But you can’t change pairs for—”
“Two moon cycles, I know.” the boy rolls his eyes. “Nor can I employ use of healing items. Thou— er, you have only informed me of such a number close to that of the feathers employed on a Loftwing.”
Why was he talking like that? “Just making sure. You can fuck up your ears pretty bad if you don’t follow the rules.”
The boy quirks an eyebrow. “Language,” he says, in the lilting tone of a joke.
Link rolls his eyes.
He watches the Rancher die, and…
The walls crack, groaning in the wind which howls, baring teeth against the bitter night, stone providing shaky protection for the two people taking shelter within the cave. They sit by the meager fire built with what little supplies they had, knowing that within hours the flame will die out, leaving their shelter in darkness once more. One of the men distracts himself by sharpening his sword, which was already deathly sharp, while the other uses a needle and thread to repair a small rip in the fabric of his scarf.
Rare was it that these two had a conversation, and both were alright with that. Traveling in a group large as theirs meant that there would always be someone whom you didn’t know quite as well, and their bond as fighters for the same cause was enough. They would set out in the morning, continue down the mountain until they met up with the others, and report nothing of interest, just an annoyance that the portal had separated them once more.
Or, rather, that was their unspoken plan. It would have been business as usual, and somewhat plain, far simpler then their other companions, who were currently fighting their way through an underground dungeon. As far as Warriors and Four were concerned, the biggest issue was their fire that was already beginning to flame out.
“We can burn that scarf of yours,” Four offers dryly.
“Or that headband of yours,” Warriors shot back.
Four holds his hands up in surrender. “Fair point.”
Both of them knew that this, hiding out in a cave, was far too easy, but neither were willing to say it aloud. In the end, it wasn’t a physical threat that endangered them, but rather a psychological one. Goddess-caused. For Link, Warriors, had earned the scorn of Time by virtue of simply existing, and she had endeavored to take revenge on his lifeline. It was now, that a piece of this revenge took place.
It happens quickly. Link’s hands shake. He sets down his embroidery, familiar enough with the process to know his best bet would be to lie down, facing Four, in the event that he would recognize the other, and if not then could pretend to sleep. He just had to trust that his brother would understand. It is one of the most frightening things that he has done.
“Guess I’m on first watch, then,” snarked Four, but by then the light had taken over Link’s vision and he could hear nothing.
Link opens his eyes.
He had gone to sleep in his bed, and the first thing he realizes is that he is no longer in his bed. He’s not in his house at all, rather surrounded by stone walls, a dying fire a few steps away. This was… bad. This was really bad. Link tries to think back, remember what his mother had told him to do, if he were to ever be kidnapped. There’s a man in front of him, sharpening a sword. Link wasn’t old enough to even play with the wooden swords. He was only ten, but his mother had said that sometimes, Bad men would target kids, because they were weaker.
Maybe it would be better to pretend to sleep? And then, once the man sleeps, he can escape. It doesn’t feel like there are any ropes or anything on his hands. There’s not even a gag in his mouth.
…He could scream for help.
“Hey,” the man whispers. Link stiffens, squeezing his eyes shut. Nope, he’s asleep, don’t bother him. “Do you want me to sharpen your sword too?”
The words don’t quite make sense, in Link’s mind. His sword? He doesn’t have a sword. Why would his kidnapper have given him a sword?
“I don’t want to touch it without permission,” the man says again.
Burning curiosity wins over common sense. Link slowly opens his eyes, pushing himself into a sitting position, and there’s a momentary wave of confusion when his eyes end up taller then they should be. “My sword?”
The man raises an eyebrow. “Yeah, your sword. Does it need sharpened?”
“Um,” Link pauses, taking the moment to let his eyes dart around the cave. It’s just the one man, unless there’s more outside, but the winds make that unlikely. “I will hold on to it myself. Thank you.”
“…Okay,” the man accepts easily enough, and Link frowns deeper.
“This isn’t a very good kidnapping,” Link snarks, regretting the words as soon as they come out of his mouth.
The man’s expression flickers through several emotions before settling on a confused sort of humor. “Did you hit your head falling out of that portal or something?”
Link thinks he might be missing something, here. A sharp light begins to trickle in the corners of his vision. He clutches at his head, a low groan escaping from his mouth. He’s shaking, his movements not under his own control. The man’s shouting, but Link can’t quite understand the words. His eyes are rolling back in his head, the light flooding his sight, until he can’t think with all the noise—
“...ors. Captain! Link!”
Four is shouting his name. Why is Four shouting his name? Goddess, his head hurts. Warriors pulls away from the hands holding him down, the firelight exasperating his migraine, and he shuts his eyes, falling back onto his bedroll. “Mhn. Fuck.”
“Warriors?” Four says gently, brushing Link’s hair out of his face. “What the hell was that?”
Good question! What was that? Warriors doesn’t remember this cave at all, so if it were a slide it must’ve been a short one, or something from way earlier in his timeline. There’s no other reason for the headache, the confusion, but the Chain didn’t know about his sliding at this point. So he’s left scrambling for an answer. “The cold must have got me confused, Smithy. I’m sorry if I said anything… upsetting.”
“‘The cold’ isn’t a good excuse for a seizure, Captain. I don’t have any potions on me, so whatever this issue is, you need to tell me, now.” Four’s face is deadly serious.
“It’s nothing to worry about. I— sometimes, because of something that happened, lose track of where I am. It doesn’t ever last over an hour. I’ve learned to handle it.” That last part is a lie, not that Four needs to know that.
“That seems like exactly the type of thing we should worry about!” Four throws his hands in the air. “You thought I had kidnapped you, or something! What if this happens again?”
“You’ve never noticed before,” Link snaps.
The silence that passes between them is deafening. Four presses his lips into a thin line, eyes seeming to flash between colors in the dying light of their fire. The wind continues to howl outside.
The first time it happens, Link is thirteen years old, and he had gotten a concussion while practicing with the guards.
He wakes up surrounded by tall, dark architecture, the hallways large and expensive, in a body too large that clanks and jingles with every step. Link makes it about four steps down the hall before he’s frightened away by loud voices, and by the time he can’t hear them anymore he’s moved so far down the winding paths that he cannot find his way back.
Link is tired, and lost, and sore. The blue scarf around his neck smells like home, and it’s the one thing keeping him from completely hyperventilating. What he doesn’t realize, but will come to learn well, is the muscle memory sticks from slide to slide. And in this case, his feet had brought him to somewhere well known to be safe.
He’s knocking on the study door before he can think about what he’s doing, and there’s only a moment to panic before the door slides open to reveal a older woman, maybe thirty or so, who crooks an eyebrow at him when he just stares.
“Who are you?” he forces himself to ask.
The woman’s face flickers with surprise and shock, eventually settling on worried understanding. She opens the door the rest of the way. “I’m Zelda, honey. Is… is this your first time, then? You said it was coming up…”
“First time?” he intones.
“Come on in, Link. There is much to explain.”
“Got your fruit for when you feel like it,” Wild calls, sliding bowls around the camp.
Legend sighs. “What’s the plan for today?”
“More walking?” Wind interjects miserably.
“Monster camp,” Four cuts in. “Wolfie found it last night. A couple of miles east. We think it’s Wild’s, since mine don’t tend to camp like that.”
“So yes, but no.” Warriors chuckles, ruffling Wind’s hair. The kid leans into the touch for a second before remembering that he’s supposed to be tough, and then he bats it away with a fake scowl.
Link had hardly had enough time to learn the other hero’s names by the time he was forced into another slide. He was by the bedside of the one with the pelt, the Rancher, clutching his hand with a tight grip, mouth mumbling through a bedside prayer. One for peaceful passage, to achieve a sense of peace in the afterlife, and once he registers what, exactly, he’s saying, Link does a double take. The Rancher’s hand is cold in his. Too cold.
The Rancher, Hylia, why can’t he remember his title, looks gaunt. Moreso than a regular corpse. A large white cloth covers most of his body, stained red. No wonder he’s praying over the kid. What happened to cause this? The armored one, Time (and he ought to speak with the man, to question how their experiences parallel, if they do at all) had mentioned a rising threat to Hyrule, creatures with oil-slick blood. Was this a consequence of that adventure?
Warriors resolves to stay far away from the blood as possible.
“He’s almost ready for a burial,” a voice adds from behind him. Warriors startles, jerking his hand away. He’s out of practice in the switch, forgot to establish his surroundings like an idiot, but luckily for him, it’s not a monster trying to kill him, but rather another of the chain. Hyrule. He remembers that name, if only for how simple it was. The traveler sighs, sitting feather light on the bed next to the Ranch Hand. “The dark magic is clearing, slowly.”
Dark magic? For a second, Link can only see the chamber, his own face reflected back at him thricefold, gray skin and hollow, red eyes. He shakes himself out of that quickly. It’s not another slide, this time, just bad memories. He would like to relive that battle never.
This, at least, is a familiar game, to find out what happened, and be sad for men he’s never met before, or in this case, had one short conversation with. They must have been traveling together for a while, then, if he feels the need to comfort the other boy, if his heart tugs at the despondent expression.
“I just wish I could be doing more.” Traveler sighs, brushing a hand over the Rancher’s sweat soaked forehead. “His magic was… resistant. Or rather, it didn’t feel like Hero magic.”
“Ah,” Link says, when it’s clear that the Traveler is waiting for some sort of response.
“I probably ought to tell Time about this,” Hyrule frowns. “I know you’re not very magical. I just, I feel so useless. You called me a hero, before. But everyone else is falling apart, and I can’t do anything.”
Goddess, the kid is crying. Link is not equipped for this. They have never had a conversation before. Although, they have perhaps had many conversations. His soul twinges, wanting to say something, and having nothing to say.
“Sorry,” Hyrule grumbles to himself. He swipes at his eyes, then stands, suddenly. “Vet’s manhandling me into some sleep. I just had to see him again before… anyway, you should get some rest too. The Old Man’s coming to say goodbye to him soon.”
“Thank you, Traveler.” Link says softly. “I will.”
That’s a lie, of course, but Hyrule doesn’t need to know that. The kid accepts it easily enough, and with one final, tender touch to the Rancher’s forehead, he leaves. Link breathes out heavily, his shoulders curling in on himself. Fuck, he thought he was over it all. He’s a liability, sliding all over the place like this, had proven as much in the army, and now he’s been forced to know that the reprieve was temporary. That things will continue as they were for this trip as well. And so he sits at the Rancher’s side, resuming the prayer he had found on his lips, and he waits to remember.
If he’s keeping track right, and Hylia knows if he’s keeping track right, this is the fourth layer of Slide that he’s in. It had gone from a fight to another fight to a dungeon to a beach day back to another fucking fight. Link had always worried that some day he’ll slide so deep that he won’t be able to find his way back.
This is nothing to think about, when a moment of hesitation will get him killed.
After the third year of the War, for normal time-occupiers, something finally changes. There’s a rip in the air next to him, and a boy is tossed out, cursing and howling. He scrambles to his feet, and luckily enough he had appeared in the lull of the fight, around the midday sun, when both sides began overheating. Link braces his sword, widening his stance for the idea of a fight.
“Och. Aye, ou‘ of prac’ice w’a por’al.” the boy spits, steadying himself on his feet. His eyes land on Link, and it’s startling to see how quickly his expression lights up. “Cap’n?”
“Stay back,” Link warns.
“Cap’n, tis! ‘ail, Wind, ye shipmate, aye!” His grin is bright and infectious. Link’s soul harmonizes with him, a feeling foreign. Slowly, though, when Link doesn’t lower his sword, the smile drops from Wind’s face. “Ah. Unless… thee’s not qui’e returned from t’journey. In w’ich, ‘ail to met, suppose! I’uh Sailor by mystery, a fi’er when I choose, ‘n look forward t’bein’ thy brother.”
By all accounts, the boy should be completely unintelligible. But for some reason, his terrible accent is nostalgic, and Warriors (where did that name come from?) can’t help the stupid grin that crosses his face.
“You smell off,” the Rancher says, leaning a little too close for comfort.
Warriors, having slid from a battle in which something had gotten in a lucky swing, detaching his pinky finger, takes a moment to adjust. He shoves Twilight out of his face, grimacing when his hand comes back grimy. “Can’t that wolfish nose of yours smell the stink on your own tunic? Address that before saying anything to my face.”
“HA! Good one, Captain! My smell is not that good! Not like a wolf at all!” Twilight laughs, loud and nervous, sparing a glance to the rest of the group, who were all wrapped up in their own business.
Link considers Twilight’s tense demeanor. This group must not know about Wolfie, yet. And he almost spoiled it. Fuck, he was getting sloppy. He was just so Goddess-damned tired.
The path has been lain already. There is little he can do to change it. Not when the Goddess Herself is against him.
“—If I had a choice I would have stayed with you.”
He blinks. Time’s looking at him like he expects a response. It’s just the two of them, the rest of the Chain sleeping nearby. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” Time adds softly. “The Goddesses didn’t want me to remember it. I kept forgetting, but then something would remind me, and eventually it stuck. Mostly.”
“I don’t believe I could forget it if I tried.” Link admits. He hopes they’re talking about something he’d remember, like the War, his curse, or that time Hyrule burned a pot of water.
Time frowns, his brow furrowing. “Do you feel alright, Captain? You seem pale.”
“I’m fine,” he lies with a tight-lipped smile. “Just a little tired, is all.”
“Are you sure?” Time presses. “Listen, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you about. I remember— back in the War, you tended to space out somewhat frequently. I hadn’t noticed it happening here as well, but a few of the others have confided in me. They’re worried about you. The Smith and the Vet, especially. If there’s something going on, Captain, you can tell me.”
Something about Time’s eyes are soft and familiar, and he finds that his soul, which he has learned to trust blindly, wants to tell Time. He can’t imagine why, but— almost as if involuntary, words begin to slip out of his mouth.
“I’m not sure how much you already know about my Adventure,” he starts.
Time raises an eyebrow. “I’d like to think I know quite a bit, seeing how I was there.”
The quip catches Warriors off guard. “You were— sorry, what?”
“I was there,” he repeats, but it doesn’t make any more sense the second time. “We just talked about it?”
“We did?”
“Yes. Not a minute ago. What is going on with you?”
Warriors takes a very large, very slow breath. It was only a matter of time before he screwed up, and at least it happened with their Old Man. No point in trying to keep anything secret now. “Then… you know about Cia. Who she was, what she did.”
The hatred that seeps into Time’s expression is so quick that Link almost misses it entirely. “Yes. I remember her.”
“She was, is, the Goddess of time. Became infatuated with the Hero’s Spirit, and well, I held it at that moment. The affection was... warped, by Ganon, turned into obsession, when I refused to do as she asked. She got angry... used the Triforce shard of Power to twist my Timeline. She said... if you won’t agree now, perhaps you’ll be amicable after some time. But she wouldn’t wait, no, she forced my Timeline forward. And when I still said no, she twisted further, until it shattered. Until I shattered. There are shards everywhere, and they cut into every inch of my life.”
“Smithy mentioned memory problems,” Time says softly. “Is that because of this… shatter?”
Warriors’ mouth is dry. After years of keeping this secret, it felt a lot more serious in the light of another perspective. “Yes. That’s… the worst part. You should understand that when I say I’ve had this my entire life, I have had this my entire life. The Slide in the cave— I’m not sure exactly how old-self I was, but it was young. And I—”
The third, fourth, and fifth time it happens is when he starts to get the hang of it.
He would be hurt, or startled, and his surroundings would start to slide, becoming fuzzy and out of focus, and then he would be somewhere else. Some when else. He doesn’t know what he had done to garner the hatred of Time herself, but it was a sin he paid for tenfold. And it’s not always useless— he learns things. Like he’ll become a Captain, eventually. Like how he’ll meet some boys whom his soul sings for like a father. Like the War, that has already broken out by the time he returns.
He tended to slide in battle. The War is not fun.
“Captain? Are you alright?” The other man asks. Link does not know who he is. But he smiles tightly, and shifts his grip on his weapon, slicing through the bodies around him. A battle is something he understands well. There is no time to stop and orient himself when every second is life-or-death, there is no time to waste on remembering.
So he shouts back, “Fine, focus on yourself! Your six!”
The man spins, his momentum carrying through the hit. It’s the move of a warrior. The creature screams, black blood spouting from the cut— what the hell, why is the blood black, and why are none of these men wearing the royal guard outfits, and Hylia is that a kid?
It definitely is, that’s a fucking kid on the field, what the fuck, who’s kid is that? Link swipes through the crowds of monsters, none of them quite staying down like they should, but eventually he manages to make his way out to the kid, who is bleeding from the nose and panting heavily, but holding his own against the hoard.
“What’s’it, Cap’?” The kid shouts in a familiar, lilting tone. But the voice is all wrong for the face, too young, baby fat on the cheeks, unpierced ears and no scar on the forehead. The dissonance gives rise to a headache, familiar in the way that he knows he should know this child, this kid with Tune’s speech and eyes.
But he can’t be Tune, who is sixteen at his arrival, who lives in the war until the bitter end of it all, who always has a new song and heightened tale. Then again— he has learned to trust his instincts above all else in uncertainty, and right now they are telling him that this kid, younger than he’s ever seen him, is his.
“Steady on,” he shouts back. “We’ll get out of this one yet!”
“Fuckin’ ope so,” Tune shouts back. “We can’ take much more o’this.”
“Less talking, more fighting!” another man spits, and Link startles, having not noticed his arrival. Odd, that the only thing Link can tell about him is his pink hair.
That’s against regulation, is all he can think, and then a spear pierces through his shoulder and the world falls back.
The pain of the slide hits him strongly. He’s thrown once more into the heat of a battle, ankle throbbing this time, and he hobbles away from the crowd. The sun’s moved further into the sky. He had only been gone a couple hours, not too bad. The men around him are wearing army clothes— he’s back where he belongs, and his eyes quickly catch on the blue tunic of the Sailor.
They can talk later, if later ever comes.
For now, he scrounges in his bag for a potion, tosses back a vial, and refocuses on his new surroundings.
A fight is something he understands well.
“Captain,” Sky says one night, when they’ve made it to an inn with some actual rooms for semi-decent privacy. “I might ask of you a favor.”
“What can I do for you?”
“Well,” Sky starts, looking nervous. “I find my-self jealous, frankly, on the matter of your jewelry. That séo éarspinl.”
Warriors blinks. “The what?”
“The éarspinl,” Sky repeats gesturing to his ears.
“My earrings?”
“Is that what you know them by?” Sky looks faintly amused. It wasn’t often that their language deviated, but it was always a little funny when they did. “Yes. Your... earrings. My ears are unpierced. You had mentioned, previously, experience in the matter. I was wondering if you would be willing to assist me?”
Damn. Link remembers this slide, if only because of how drastic the change was. But it’s not as if he can go, ‘Would you be alright with seventeen-self piercing them?’ because that would take way too much explaining, so instead he just smiles. “I’m honored that you asked me. Of course I will.”
It’s one of the only times that he’ll anticipate a slide so far in advance.
The thing about knowing exactly how your future plays out is the instinctual need to try and change things for the better. Link watches things happen, and he’ll slide back to an earlier point, and he thinks, maybe this can be an advantage after all, but the curse, or Hylia, having shattered the timeline at several points herself, eventually ensures that events pass as they are supposed to.
He watches as they lose a battle, horribly, and leads the troops around the intended path, directly into traps that the too-smart monsters had lain.
He watches a war break out, and is taken to a point after which it has already begun.
He watches as his future becomes yet another adventure, and the portal leading so teleports under his feet when he tries to avoid it entirely.
He watches the Rancher die, and…
It's early morning, and Link— Warriors, is the first one awake. Probably had the morning watch, if the growing headache is to be believed. Near the fire, an iron pot of something that resembles oatmeal bubbles, and he pokes at it with a wooden spoon.
There's an aggressively loud yawn from behind him, and Warriors turns around to see Time, overdramatically stretching. "Morning," he says, moving closer to the fire.
Something about that yawn, about the bleariness, is so familiar that Warriors can feel his brain resetting. He leans back, unconsciously grabbing Time’s face, and squinting into the older man’s eye. It should be impossible, and yet, he realizes why the marks on the Old Man’s face had been bugging him since the first moment he saw them. They were identical to the marks on Mask’s, well, mask. The one which he had called a curse, the one he had only used once and fought nightmares for weeks afterward.
It should be impossible. And the idea of it is so funny, to contrast the image of his sacrilegious little kid who somehow taught the Sailor swears, with the group’s steady Old Man. It’s so funny, that instead of saying anything he should, or even asking for confirmation, Link can’t help but laugh. It quickly dissolves into hysterics, and tears start to swim in his eyes with the force of his laughter, while Time, Mask, just stares at him, a faint smile on his face.
“Figured it out, then?” Is all he says, and then he starts laughing too, and they’re giggling at each other, until Link is lightheaded with it.
“You are in so much trouble,” he throws out, running a finger along Time’s cheek. “I believe I told you to stay out of Goddess-matters.”
“She didn’t exactly give me a choice, Captain.” Time snarks back, face twitching when Warriors prods a little too close to his eye.
Warriors leans back. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I didn’t want to risk telling you if you didn’t already know, and Sailor’s too young to remember.” Time shrugs. “For what it’s worth, you seem to have grown into yourself.”
“You want to talk about growing into yourself?” Warriors raises an eyebrow. “You’re massive, sprite. Half the reason I didn’t recognize you sooner.”
“That’s on outside influences, I believe.” His fingers brush the top of his bag of masks, and again, the reminder of the Deity mask forces its way to the front.
Warriors purses his lips. The sunrise is blinding. “I always worried about you, you know. Technically you’ve been gone for five years, or just shy of it. The war’s only been over for .”
“I didn’t!” Hyrule shrieks, a fist tugging at his hair. “I didn’t give up!”
The Vet looks positively rabid, a snarl on his face and anger in his eyes as he thrashes in Sky’s arms, two seconds away from tackling Hyrule. Warriors feels frozen to the spot, and when he reaches up, there are tears on his cheeks.
“This does not help, Veteran,” Sky shouts over Legend’s fighting. “Calm yourself!”
“Le’me go,” he growls.
Link finds his voice, eventually. He pushes himself in between Legend and Hyrule. “Stop. Stop it! What has gotten into you?”
Legend shoves Sky aside, the other man stumbling with the force of it. His nose is bleeding; Link hadn’t noticed until now. Hyrule sobs, sinking down to the floor.
“Fuck you,” Legend spits. “No wonder our Hyrule’s fucked. It should never have been trusted to you.”
He storms away, off into the trees, Sky following angrily. Hyrule’s still on the ground, his sobs muffled by the force of which he’s biting his sleeve.Warriors crouches to his level, gently sweeping the bangs out of his face. “Talk to me, Traveler.”
Hyrule’s trembling, his eyes wild and unfocused.
“Deep breaths,” Link instructs.
“I’m sorry,” he bites, sobbing again. “I didn’t– I couldn’t— I could’ve–”
“Link, listen to me. Legend didn’t mean what he said,” Warriors says calmly, moreso than he feels. “He’s… angry, and taking that out on you. It’s not fair, not at all. Nobody blames you.”
“They should.”
“Why?”
Hyrule’s stopped shaking, at least, but his bottom lips still trembles as he speaks. “I could have– the trees know I could have given the Rancher more magic. It w-wasn’t working right and it was taking too much but I could’ve– I should've given more, and I probably would have died but at least– at least he might still be here and—”
He dissolves into tears again, and it’s all Warriors can do to hold him tightly, making shh noises and stroking his hair. “Link, you’re not replaceable. If reviving the Rancher was killing you, then it wasn’t worth it. He wouldn’t have wanted that. You know he wouldn’t have wanted that.”
“We’re falling apart,” he says miserably. “He kept us together. I don’t do anything, and everyone blames me, and I’m just— poisoned. I could have done something. But I didn’t. He should hate me. I cer-certainly hate myself.”
Warriors… doesn’t know what to say, after that. So he says nothing, and instead just continues to hold Hyrule, until he’s quiet once more, with the words he kept us together ringing in his mind.
He watches the Rancher die, and…
Captain Link pants heavily, leaning on his shield. Around him, the corpses of a thousand ‘blins, maybe more, lay rotting, all while his men slowly recover, emerging like ants among the still bodies. They’ve about won this battle, looks like, despite the few cooling cadavers of army men in the wreckage. He hopes, fiercely, that none of these men were immediately important to current-self. He’s tired of borrowing grief from the future.
“Captain!” A familiar, accented voice shouts. The sight of the Sailor sprinting towards him, an unconscious Mask in his arms, snaps him back into a soldier mindset immediately.
“Wind, is he alright?” He asks, reaching out to feel for a fever. Mask feels fine, but he’s unresponsive and—
“What’d ye say?” There’s an odd sort of tension in Wind’s voice.
Link glances up at him. “I asked if Mask was alright.”
Something uncomfortable in Wind’s shoulders shifts. “He– He’s fine. Exhausted, is’ll. Used that mask ‘gain. I meant, tho’, why’d you call me Wind?”
“Because that’s your title?” One of the ‘blins gurgles, and Warriors stabs into the corpse until it falls silent again. At least they all had red blood. An army this size, they would never have stood a chance.
“Wars,” Wind’s voice trembles. “Do you— remember?”
Link senses he’s made a mistake of some sort. It takes two seconds of staring blankly at his brother before it kicks in— that it is not, in fact, Wind; it’s Tune.
“It’s… complicated, Tune.” Link looks away, biting at his lip. “Something from my adventure. I get confused sometimes, but that’s all. I remember it now, but shortly current-self won’t. That’s the reason I had never told the group. Not when they’d just be looking for a man who wasn’t there.”
“So you’ll just… forget again? Captain, that’s not fair.” Wind’s expression is open, honest and hurting.
“No,” Link frowns. “It’s not. But for as long as I remember, Wind, I’ll be here to talk to.”
“Why are you remembering now?”
“I can’t control it. I can’t, and I have to accept that I can’t. These little snatches of in-between are what I live my life on. I’ve traveled with the Chain, I’ve beaten this war, I’ve learned so much of what I’ve been through, and I still know I have more left. I piece my timeline together chronologically, picking apart what I can.”
“And you’ve been like this, what, the whole time?”
“I’ve gotten good at hiding it.”
Everything aches, when he opens his eyes. He’s lying in bed, sunlight stretching across the floor. His hands are wrinkled beyond recognition, his hair thin and gray. He’s old, at the end of his life.
It is quiet.
It’s the silence that really gets to him, makes him itch for something, anything to be happening. But nothing does. Instead, it’s just the silence, and the quiet ticking of a clock somewhere nearby.
Is this the end fit for a Warrior?
His body hurts too much to move, his mind slowly slipping. Trapped in his own skin, with a burning desire for action. It is rare that a solider lives this long. Those who do are often surrounded by well-wishers, at the least people who send cards and flowers. But his room is empty. There is no use for him, not after the war, and he sees it now in the bare room, in the way that not even Zelda shows up for a visit. He’s vestigial, use contingent on the possibility of a battle he would be too old to fight in, anyway.
He can feel each breath leave his chest, bigger than whatever air he managed to intake.
He can feel his heart slowing down.
When he dies, he does it knowing that this wasn’t right.
“I didn’t!” Hyrule shrieks, a fist tugging at his hair. “I didn’t give up!”
The Vet looks positively rabid, a snarl on his face and anger in his eyes as he thrashes in Twilight’s arms, two seconds away from tackling Hyrule. Warriors feels frozen to the spot, and when he reaches up, there are tears on his cheeks.
“Hylia, Vet, calm the fuck down,” Twilight shouts over Legend’s fighting.
“Le’me go,” he growls.
Link finds his voice, eventually. He pushes himself in between Legend and Hyrule. “Stop. Stop it! What has gotten into you?”
Legend shoves Twilight aside, the other man stumbling with the force of it. His nose is bleeding; Link hadn’t noticed until now. Hyrule sobs, sinking down to the floor.
“Fuck you,” Legend spits. “No wonder our Hyrule’s fucked. It should never have been trusted to you.”
He storms away, off into the trees, Twilight following angrily. Hyrule’s still on the ground, his sobs muffled by the force of which he’s biting his sleeve.Warriors crouches to his level, gently sweeping the bangs out of his face. “Talk to me, Traveler.”
But Hyrule doesn’t respond. And Link is too dead to speak with him properly.
They sit by the campfire, himself and Wild, and the Cook is leaning against Link’s shoulders. He had made a comment earlier that day, something about, hope we find the others soon, and so Link doesn’t bother worrying about their absence. The firelight glints off of Wild’s scars, and before he can stop himself, his mouth is moving.
“What did you say?” Wild asks.
Warriors bites his tongue.
Wild shifts, looking at him face to face.
“I said,” he licks his lips. It’s dusty. “What did it feel like to die?”
“I don’t remember,” Wild says plainly. And the shame of asking is enough to keep Link quiet for the rest of the night.
He can’t breathe like this. Surrounded by all these men. Fighters, the lot of them, and frankly quite rank. He can’t breathe, and so he quietly drops to the back of the group, sighing when they’re in front of him, and he doesn’t have to worry about his own back. He feels happy here, no panic or caution at all in his soul, but that doesn’t stop his breath from halting in his throat, from the creeping sensation of being watched to crawl up his spine. So he moves to the back of the group, and tries to figure out where he is. He thinks, carefully tasting the thought on his tongue, that he would die for these men.
He thinks that he already has.
There’s something about knowing you’re going to die that makes the air just a little bit sweeter. Link wanders with the Chain, and every time he looks around at these men, current-self’s brothers, he wonders what’s going to happen. When will it happen? He knows that he’s on a time limit, now. That he could either decide to live and let them fall apart, or die so that they don’t. He’s seen how it plays out, somewhere in his mind. There’s two lines inside of his soul, and they are parallel, and they are perpendicular. The point is this: he dies, or he doesn’t. There is little else that could be done.
Twilight knocks against his shoulder, a silent question— you okay? And Link smiles back.
“More walking?” Wind interjects miserably.
“Monster camp,” Four cuts in. “Wolfie found it last night. A couple of miles east. We think it’s Wild’s, since mine don’t tend to camp like that.”
“So yes, but no.” Warriors chuckles, ruffling Wind’s hair. The kid leans into the touch for a second before remembering that he’s supposed to be tough, and then he bats it away with a fake scowl.
“Any idea what color pelt?” Wild asks.
Four shakes his head.
“Maybe we shouldn’t, um, fight.” Hyrule says, staring wide-eyed at Legend.
Legend raises an eyebrow. “Why’s that?”
“You’re limping,” Hyrule says plainly.
His scowl deepens. “It isn’t important.”
“I think it’s important,” Hyrule argues. “Maybe we can take it to a vote. Hey guys—“
“Shut the fuck up,” Legend hisses.
“If the Vet’s having a problem,” Warriors interjects, “Then he can tell up about it like a man. I know he would never hide something from the group, not when it would endanger our efficiency in combat. Right, Veteran?”
“It’s fine. Seriously.” He snaps, rolling his eyes.
There’s a darknut— where on earth did the darknut come from? And where did Twilight go? He can’t handle this alone— and somehow, he’s managed to get its sole attention, across the campsite from the others, where he waits, and watches— he’s only ever fought one of these before, and current-self feels unsteady, frantic, like a terrible thing has happened.
He doesn’t know where the Rancher is.
Shit. He can hear Wolfie in the distance, and his timeline tugs, forcing him forward. He knows how this plays out. He has never been able to change things before.
Link watches as they lose a battle, horribly, and leads the troops around the intended path, directly into traps that the too-smart monsters had lain. He watches a war break out, and is taken to a point after which it has already begun. He watches as his future becomes yet another adventure, and the portal leading so teleports under his feet when he tries to avoid it entirely. He watches the Rancher die, and…
Well. Link has always tended to do what he’s told. Maybe, this time, he can try something different.
The darknut swings,
and he can see Wolfie lunging,
and he is supposed to duck.
He does not.