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bokettochild · 9 months ago

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Febuwhump Day 18

@nancyheart11 you asked me for a Twilight Whump for this one, so I did my best! He wasn't talking, but it's a little tastier with the spice of another perspective >:)

I hope you enjoy!

Rating: Gen

Wordcount:

Summary: They talked about wandering off alone, but that doesn't exactly stop certain people (AKA Twilight) from not doing it again. Maybe Warriors is taking it too personally, but Mask's pup is giving him a headache. He just wants all his little brothers safe in one place, is that too much to ask?

(Note: I have not proof written this. My apologies, but half my keys aren't working, so typos are probably there.)

They do not run off alone, they just don’t! It’s not so much a rule as something that everyone understands, so why in Hylia’s name is it still so hard for the others to actually do? Warriors resists the urge to hiss at himself; he is not Mask or Wild, he is not a feral little creature that can’t use his words, but by Hylia’s Wings does he wish he could get away with it sometimes!

They’d talked about this! Not at length, and yes, his opinions had been very quickly dismissed in favor of discussing the ability of their enemy to shapeshift, but he’d expressed his disapproval with running off alone in the middle of a battle!

But who really listens to him anyway?

No, the captain stops in his tracks for a moment to shake off that thought, that’s not fair. Most of the other heroes listen. For Wind it’s second nature, and Time too, most days, listens without thinking about it. Even as an adult, the other respects his experience in leadership and knowledge of fighting and working with others. Four, even for his faults when it comes to actually working with and not simply around other people, still hears him out when he speaks. Sky and Hyrule both respect him for his title of knight and the work he’d put in to earn it, and even Legend, who despises soldiers, will respect his decisions and follow the plans he’s set. Yes, there's some disconnect, which is to be expected when working with a new team of people that aren’t accustomed to each other just yet, but they’re trying. Most of them are trying.

Twilight and Wild are their own story.

The captain’s teeth saw against each other as he ducks through the underbrush, following the faint trail left by big paws and the even bigger tracks of a moblin. How can a person be so determined to keep others in line and behaving, to keep others in the group safe and obeying the rules, and yet they themselves trod all over them?

Granted, he is also currently separate from the group, wandering off alone, but he’s not the only one and everyone else knows what he’s doing. He’s tracking Twilight while the rest collect themselves and make camp. Wild had offered to do it, but after the last time, he just can’t trust the kid to actually come back; Wild’s proved where his loyalties lie, and it’s with the rancher, not their group. When asked to make the choice, they all know what it would be.

He told the champion to stay.

He doesn't know if he’ll be listened to, since that’s also the other point of struggle here, but he’s done all he can. He’s a good tracker, used to picking up the slightest sign of enemy activity, and his reasoning of being their current medic and thus the best choice in the case Twilight had gotten injured in some way, seems to be reason enough for most of the rest. There’s offers of course, to have someone go with him as backup, but looking over the tired men and boys in camp, he turns them all down. They need the rest, and time to recover from their own injuries and exhaustion. As a soldier, he’s been trained to push his limits, his exhaustion, his pain, his physical abilities, and ignore all barriers until his assignment is completed. The others may be heroes, ones who’ve faced odds that soldiers could never imagine, but they’re not likely to have experienced that sort of pressure and he wouldn’t want them to.

They need their rest. He can get his once his duty is done.

Now if only Twilight wouldn’t make it so hard by having wandered off to Nayru knows where!

A hand drags through his hair, disrupting it, but it doesn’t matter. Yes, there’s a small voice that hisses to fix it, one that sounds a bit like Proxi, but these heroes care even less for how he looks on any given day than for what he says.

Still being unfair, Link. They aren’t all bad. They’re good kids.

Sure, they’d probably all take offence at being called kids but that’s what they are! The youngest are very young and even Time, their eldest, still looks to him through force of habit for guidance and aid. At most, he’d say the oldest most of them could be is twenty, early twenties for the rancher and skyloftian, but that’s still young enough to still be tripping over themselves in an effort to understand adulthood. They are, in his mind, still kids, and they’re mostly good ones, so he really can’t go lumping them all together as not giving a darn when they very much do. Not about his looks, thank Hylia, but about what he has to say? Most definitely.

Again, it’s just Time’s pups who don’t.

Goddesses, they take after their old man to an extreme level! It feels like just yesterday he was chasing down the little scamp, explaining the importance of comradery, of trust, of teamwork. Just yesterday, he was tilting brilliant blue eyes up to meet tired ones and asking, nearly begging, for the kid to please just give his way a chance.

He sort of doubts such methods will work on his kid’s much older pup though.

Twilight and Wild are similar in that they are stubborn, but they’re also much older than Mask had been, and neither is desperate for the stability the young boy had sought. They have Tie and each otehr, their own little bubble, separate from the rest of the heroes, and while both have an obvious respect for his skill, that’s about where their respect for him ends. They don’t look up to him, don’t admire him, don’t see him as anything more than another hero in their group, which is nice as far as not needing to babysit them goes. He’s glad that they don’t need him to keep an eye on them, that they’re stable enough mentally and in their perception of themselves that they don’t need someone else to support them, and if they do, they’ve already found that in each other. Still, having even the smallest of ways to get through to either of them would be nice.

He’d thought that experience with the army would help connect him with the champion, that maybe a bond with Time could be something he could connect with the rancher about, but so far, no dice.

His feet skid slightly on some leaves, bringing his attention back to the task at hand. Right, he needs to find Twilight. He can worry about driving home the idea of not running off alone when he’s sure the other is still alive. Granted, they didn’t see the black lizalfoes, or anything they think might have been another form of the beast, in this last battle, but it doesn’t take the most powerful of monsters to lay a hero low, especially if they don’t have anyone to watch their backs.

The paw prints change to boot prints with the same seamlessness as they’d become paws at the beginning of the trail, and blood, crimson not black, spatters on the ground in an arc that indicates a swinging blade right where the moblin’s feet shift into a spin to face its pursuer. The trail of blood falls to the left of the trail, which means it could be delt by the left-handed hero or by the opposing monster, but considering the sudden turn, his money is on the rancher being the injured party here.

By habit, his hand falls to his bag, assuring himself he’s got his med kit close at hand.

By the three, these boys could save themselves so much pain if they just covered each others’ asses! Next time they get to the ranch or any place where they can stop for a little, he’s asking Time to help him arrange a training session for these kids. Maybe with their unofficial leader’s support, he can even get the two pups in on the session. As is, he’s sure Wind and four will be willing, and Sky will most definitely be his most valuable asset in teaching them. Good grief, whatever the Knights Academy on Skyloft is teaching, they're doing a great job, because that boy melds seamlessly in with whomever is closest to him!

That may or may not be why he keeps close to the skyloftian, but who can blame him for wanting the assurance of having someone to watch his back when he’s so busy trying to keep an eye on all the others all the time?

Twilight could have used the same, and blood specks along the trail as he goes. The steps become distorted, shuffling over each other in what’s clearly a break from the chase to fight. Here though, seven or eight paces from the initial blood spatter, more footprints join the mix. A bokoblin- no, two of them. The rancher’s steps disappear for a short moment, but with some looking around he finds them again. A flip or a throw landed him behind his foe, but he’s pushed back, heels dragging as they shuffle backwards into the woods as the enemy presses forwards against him.

More tracks join the mix; an ambush.

He grits his teeth, pushing forwards, ignoring, for the most part, the trail of the monsters in favor of following boot prints that press heavily to the dirt at the heel and toe, running, now pursued rather than the pursuer. The rancher will have known to try and limit the area of approach from his foes by darting into the trees. At best, he’d have circled around to pick them off from behind, but the prints don’t indicate as much. The speed of the different monster types will change have changed the tides of the fight though, with the bokoblins moving faster, prints fading out entirely as they likely fell and faded to miasma, leaving behind a moblin trail that continues, joined by more of its kind. He’d estimate at least three, maybe five of the creatures.

Not great odds for one already injured rancher.

He picks up his own pace. There’s no sounds of battle ahead or anywhere close by, not that he can hear. Granted, cannon fire in the war has definitely damaged his hearing enough that he could just be missing it, but he chooses to believe that there’s nothing, if only in the hope that Twilight will somehow be headed back along the trail towards him already, instead of being even further out, still in the middle of a fight.

He doesn’t stumble across the rancher walking along the path though. No, he follows the fight, the footprints, trailing through the trees until there’s nowhere else to go. A wall of earth, steep enough to be a struggle to climb for anyone currently being chased, rises up and the footprints spin about to face those following after. He doesn’t keep track after that though, because the moment he sees fur and brass armor that catches the fading light, he knows his search is done.

“There you are, rancher.”

The urge to steal Time’s thunder and call the other man a pup- not with the affection of the now older man but with all the ire of its original connotation among his own people, is strong, but he resists. That would be considered out of line without context, and he doubts Twilight even knows the source of the nickname he so values from his mentor.

Knowing it means a young person who’s annoying but not yet unbearable, yet, would probably kill some of that magic.

So, he bites his tongue, keeps his impulses to himself, and moves to the side of the younger man, who’s currently slumped against a tree, breath strained but still there as dark eyes, a shade or so darker than Time’s own, flutter slightly with an effort to stay open.

“Cap’n?”

Darker or not, there’s definitely a lot of Time- of Mask, in the rancher’s face, and it makes staying mad with him a bit of a challenge when he’s looking so pathetic. “Got yourself in quite the situation, haven’t you,” he hums, kneeling at the younger’s side and taking his time with a once over. The rancher’s tunic has taken damage, but his concern is where crimson leaks from the tears, not where blades have slashed through only to be halted by chain mail. Yes, the bruising won’t be fun, but his concern is something he can fix, anything that Twilight will actually need help with.

There’s a wince from the other. “Not my intent.”

“Never is,” he unclips the bag from his belt, eyes falling on a nasty looking gash just below the cut off of the chainmail’s sleeves. There are some light scratches over browned features and an injury to the leg that leaks slowly into the earth below, but the rancher’s armor looks to have done its job well.

“The others?”

“Fine.” He keeps his attention on slipping the bracer from his brother’s arm, on unbuckling and sliding away the leather, the underlying glove, and then rolling up the sleeve to get at the injury he needs to treat. Wound care fills his mind, not answers, not talking. That can come once he’s assured that the other is alright. Much as the man drives him mad, he’s still Time’s kid, and still a fellow hero, still a brother, still someone who doesn’t deserve to suffer just because he’s particularly good at being stupid and reckless.

“Wild?”

“Fine.” He repeats, sucking in his cheeks as he sees the damage done without fabric blocking the way. Claws do so much more damage than blades, and the chances of infection are higher too. Not as much as with bites, but it’s still not preferrable.

“The kids?”

He huffs, turning to grab for his kit, looking for anything he might have to quickly clean the wound. “You’d know if you didn’t run away mid battle.”

Hurt crosses sloping features briefly, not for the prodding at the wound site, but from his sharp tongue. Regret stirs briefly at his heart, but like his ire, he pushes it down to keep his head clear and his mind focused on his work as their team’s current medic.

“Yer upset.”

The urge to tell the kid ‘no shit’ is very strong, but he bottles up that too. Instead, he keeps his eyes on the wound, on wiping it down and looking for anything that might have gotten into the cut.

Twilight’s ears flick back, not appreciating having his words ignored. If there’s one thing the rancher is accustomed to, it’s answers when he speaks. Wild always answers, Time too even if it’s not verbal, and the younger ones always respond to. Being met with silence, both verbally and in body language, must be new to him. “Did somethin’ happen?” And when he still doesn't answer, “Wars, what’s goin’ on?”

“They’re fine, now hush.” It’s a deep cut. Not as bad as the axe wound, but not light by any means either, and it will need stitches. He keeps his needles in a bottle, clean and ready for use, for this reason. Mask used to fuss that it was a waste of a good bottle, and the thought lightens his heart just slightly as he pulls it out and grabs the needed supplies to close the wound in the rancher’s arm.

“No, Wars-” there’s a straining from the body beneath his hands, but Twilight doesn’t successfully pull himself up, and his face flashes white for a moment before he slumps again. It seems the mighty rancher has spent all his strength in fighting alone, nothing left to use to so much as sit up by himself.

“Stay still,” he sighs, pushing down, entirely unnecessarily, against a shoulder. It’s for the sake of the man’s pride, he tells himself, to pretend to play along that twilight can get up on his own right now. “Let me work.”

Work and bottle up his frustrations enough that he can talk afterwards.

Twilight, however, has no such intentions of likewise staying silent. “Captain, what’s goin’ on?”

“I said stay still.”

“Are they hurt?” Blue eyes bleed worry, the same desperation his mentor used to let slip, sometimes still does when it’s his pup in trouble or hurt. “What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Why are you actin’ like this then?”

The urge to growl again rises, and again he shoves it down with pursed lips and clenched teeth, focusing his energy on starting the stitches and hoping the pain of them will be enough to distract the younger man from his line of questioning. It doesn’t work though.

“Wars?”

“Twilight,” his voice snaps without his allowing it, eyes flicking up to meet midnight blue, “I’m trying to focus. Stitches aren’t easy, believe it or not.”

They’re familiar and he’s done more stitches in his life through human flesh and zora scales than his baby sisters have in their needlework projects that Maither gives them. He won’t admit that though, not if it gives him an out from having to talk. Honestly, some days, he really misses having Proxi around to speak for him when he’s stressed. She was always much better at that sort of thing than he was.

Twilight falls quiet at his words though, but he still feels those eyes fixed on him, searching his face even as their gaze is broken with a flinch or a huff of pain as the needle pressed through flesh and pulls the two edges of the cut together. He has to stop a few times to dab away blood and clear the area for the next stitch, but he’s quick about his work. In and out, twisting the thread together to close the wound, moving on to the next stitch and watching as the flesh pulls together again over where blood leaks out.

He's done before he’s ready to talk again, but bandaging is something they’ve all done, and he can’t say that actually takes so much focus as to stop him talking, and Twilight knows it, already pressing again with the questions. “Wars-”

A scoff escapes, puffing hair out of his eyes to clear them, even though having it to hide behind would be much more preferable. “You really are Time’s pup, aren’tcha?”

A tick. “What does that mean?”

He ties off the ends of the linen wrap, tight enough to hold but not so much as to cut off circulation. “You’re a worrier and a fuss pot.”

Heavy brows crease in answer, but Twilight doesn’t actually have a foot to stand on when it comes to opposing his words. Instead, the rancher just stares at him, waiting until Warriors turns his attention to the injured leg, arm finished.

It’s only once he’s gotten a start on treating the cut there (this time from a blade) that the rancher’s voice rises again, guarded and wary. “You’re mad at me,”

He doesn’t answer.

Rather than guess why, Twilight pushes ahead. “I couldn’t let that moblin escape. We don’t know what’s out here, and letting it terrorize a village jist wouldn’t do. You know that, Wars.” When there’s no answer though, the country accent keeps rolling, pitching slightly, straining. “There was a whole ‘nother camp out here, one that might have attacked us in the night!” And then, when still no answer sounds from his lips, “You would have done the same.”

“I would not.” He clips, snipping his thread and briefly glancing over at wide eyes. “I would have attended to my men and then pursued the enemy when we, as a team, were capable of doing so Wandering off on my own is what nearly lost us the war. So, as a rule, I won’t be doing that again unless I absolutely must.”

That shuts the rancher up, recognition dawning in midnight eyes that falter and fall as he turns his attention back to tending wounds.

There’s no more pushing done by either party, and it’s quiet as he works save the hisses and hitches of the younger man’s breath in pain as stitches are laid and bandages wrapped. That done though, the quite is almost overwhelming, even to him, and he finds himself sighing at it, crouching before his pup’s pup and resisting, with a lot of effort, the urge to hook a finger under the other's chin and lift that gaze to meet his own, like he’d done with his own kid what feels like only yesterday. Instead, he keeps his hands to himself, but gentles his gaze all the same. It’s not that hard, not when faced with familiar features drawn up in a soft scowl that, were it Mask, he’d teasingly call a pout. “I’m not mad,” a disbelieving look meets his own at the words, but he pushes his tone a bit firmer with the next ones. “I’m frustrated, but we can work over that later, preferably after we’ve all had dinner and some rest. For now, we should head back to the others, before your cub starts thinking we’ve dropped off the face of the world or something.”

A furrow forms between dark brows, too sharp teeth, wolf teeth he muses to himself, gnawing at the other's cheek lining. It’s a bad habit, and he’s sure the man knows it, but he doesn’t correct it. That’s not his place.

He can guess what’s troubling Twilight though. “Can you stand?”

A huff, a little smile that’s flustered enough he can guess the answer. “Not really.”

He knew it. He doesn’t hold it against the other though, instead, shifting to kneeling at the man’s side, shuffling about as he must before giving a waring of his intent. “I’ll carry you then.”

Alarm flashes clear as day over the rancher’s face. “Cap, I don’t-”

“I’m stronger than I look,” he assures, although it doesn’t seem to do any good. No doubt, twilight’s staring at his slighter frame and remembering his own bulk, but honestly, he’d served for years in the army. If he couldn’t haul an injured soldier any distance, he wouldn’t be worth the rupees he earns.

Getting Twilight up on his back with no help from the weakened rancher or anyone else is a bit of a mess, and there’s some slipping and struggle which the rancher no doubt sees as proof that this is no good, but despite protests, he keeps at it until the other is slung over his back. Twilight is heavy, much more so than the other boys would be, but it’s not his first time hauling an Ordonian to safety, and the bulk of his brother just means he moves a bit slower than he would otherwise.

Twilight’s grip around his neck is weaker than is ideal, but in the long run, it’s probably better that way, because it means his breath doesn't get cut off as he heads back to camp.

Like he said, once they’re there, when they’ve had something to eat, and probably after the rancher downs a potion from his cub’s bag, they’ll need to talk. This time, he will not accept having them change the subject or redirect. This time they will discuss going off alone.

After though. After they’ve had time to catch their breath. And he supposes, shaking his head, after Twilight wakes up again from the doze he’s apparently fallen into.

Good grief, the man even snores as loud as his mentor!

#asks and answers #linked universe #linkeduniverse #lu warriors #lu twilight #febuwhump2024 #febuwhump #ketto writes #dad warriors #he is not ready to be a grandpa guys #but is very weak to the puppy children in this group #he will not admit it #but he is #yes i am referencing the update like a madwoman #it's free warriors and twi angst though!#can you blame me?

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