Linked universe || Oneshots

Concept: botw Link really liked water, from spending time in Zora's Domain as a child.

But now, he cannot stand fully submerging himself, because it reminds him of being submerged in the shrine of resurrection.

^Idea from anonymous tumblr ask

~~~

The wooden ladle turned practiced circles around the cast iron pot, occasionally scraping the bottom as it swirled and stirred a delicious amber broth until every ingredient sang together. Although appetizing, as any soup could be prepared by his hands, it would be amiss for Wild to proclaim its shallow murkiness to the perfectly clear lake before him. The vista of small waterfalls churning out endless replenishing streams, did little to taint the crystal like body of water they fed into.

Although, it's transparency was too quickly muddied as a chorus of flailing arms drummed up sediment and sand from the lakebed to gather around frantic bobbing heads. Wind was showing them a pirate game, using an inflatable ball that of course Legend just so happened to have stashed somewhere in his bottomless stash of junk. What started as a curious new way to pass the time soon morphed into a two-teamed mess of a sport, if one could call it that. Tetra's crew would have been impressed with the amount of rule breaking.

Even the prissy Captain and stick-up-his-ass Rancher joined in. Surprisingly they were the two dirtiest cheats, childishly bending the rules to give his team an advantage only to feign innocence when the other caught him out on it.

'Looks fun', Wild mused, watching the sailor mediate another 'out of bounds' argument between Sky and Four. Smiles adorning their faces.

Time looked on from a shady patch near the bank, arms crossed and two-handed blade 'at the ready' under the guise of keeping watch. But they knew better.

He too, seeing Wild frequently take pause from his soup to watch the game, knew better than to wrongly assume he didn't want to join in. However, when he got up and walked over to him the champion shook his head before he could say a word.

"Go on." The old man slightly tilted his head in their direction, quietly disarming Wild of his ladle. "You deserve a break."

He wasn't given an option to get it back. Unwilling to leave yet and not knowing what to do with his hands he awkwardly folded them, letting his feet shuffle on the spot as his eyes wandered back to the others. "That looks pretty tiring to me."

Time started stirring the soup, copying Wild's technique near perfectly. "It's little more than floating. Besides, someone needs to add some civility to that game."

Wild smirked, sucking in air through his teeth in a mock gasp. "You're asking me?"

"You seem quite eager to join them."

"No." A sigh. "Just...it looks kinda familiar, I guess, maybe."

The steady rhythm of Time's stirring faulted and the man trained his eyes on that of Wild's, waiting for that distinctive spaced out look. "Everything alright...?"

It didn't come. "Yeah yeah, fine," Wild affirmed. A pause, his body still for the briefest moment. Then, a final glance at the sparkling water sent unfolded arms to tug off his tunic. "You know what? They need another player so they have even teams." Catching Time's smile he threw off the rest of his layers, swaths of mismatched blues and tans were cast into the air as his guided him towards the bank, leaving a pile of mess behind him.

The water was much cooler than anticipated, sending fleeting trails of ice up through his veins with every step forward, each smaller than the last. Cold lingered within his chest, settling like frost, his breathing turned shallower and shallower as his body was further encased in the deepening pool. Until...he was rather unceremoniously submerged.

Wild's entrance was welcomed by a score of cheers and light splashes that his bobbing head almost flinched away from, just barely, feet eventually lifting off the waterbed.

Adept limbs flowed with well practiced fluidity, the movement helping warm them. He didn't need to hear the rules, whether that was because he'd been paying attention while spectating or deep down it was too similar to a game he played as a child, he couldn't tell.

Wind bounced the ball towards him, it flew up and hid in the sun's blinding light before coming back down as an inflated octo balloon. By reflex Wild's muscles tensed and his arm jerked to attention, batting it away to have it land into the scaly arms of a Zora. He couldn't put a name to the blurry face when they were abruptly shoved under the water by another, then another, then another.

Rarely, memories came and went in small bursts like this. Never any less welcome but easier to ride out, for his mind allowed the body to move and allowed him to almost act out the memory as it happened. He remembered this game and it was stupid, a dumb excuse to goof off with the Zora guards- these figures looked vaguely like them.

Their mock battle for the balloon continued, coloured fins churning up the water in the scramble, and a smile split Wild's cheeks though confusion stained his expression. Choking up a laugh his hand waved away at nothing, as if it would make the vision fade.

However it did, quite suddenly in fact, when a scaly mass was thrown against his side, another faceless Zora crashed into him. Suddenly forced underwater, the volley of hues were lost into a growing murky night sky filled with dots of light breaking through plumes of granite dust stirred up from below. Falling further still, those strange stars grew bigger, bleeding together until he saw blue again in circular lights. Familiar. circular. lights.

Suddenly, more blue, darker in hue and crueler in the way hands them held him down. Dense fluid squeezed in from very direction onto every, pressing down with the weight of a kingdom. His limbs became rigid. Paralysed. He was floating yet he felt so trapped, eyes wide as they stared helplessly towards the lights.

They stared back, waiting for him above the surface.

Desperate, a cry escapes past quivering lips and what's left of his breath escapes with it in a cluster of bubbles. A burst of sound through the dissonance of swishing muffled ambience shutting him away in this dark basin again. Now the watery coffin that staged his brush with death.

His mind slips and the light fades...

...dimmer

...dimmer

...dimmer

...how long until he wakes up?

~~~

Word count: 1027

Thanks for reading!

Trying to convey Wild's love-hate relationship with water was hard and it got a little too abstract at the end but I'm fairly happy with it.

p.s. I realised too late that instead of a ball game in a lake they should have been surfing at the beach. Then I could have called the fic 'Waterboarding', get it? Cuz he'd be water boarding and then get waterboarded. I know waterboarding drowns the person with a soaked cloth, but he's drowning so...it kinda works right? Still, messed up tho.