Work Text:
Breath in. Breath out.
Link swung his feet through the air, seated atop a fallen tree. It had clearly fallen ages ago - moss and other growth covered the jagged edges where the trunk had fractured and given way under its own weight. The idea made Link laugh, but the sound wasn’t happy.
Breath in. Breath out.
His feet continued to swing in a measured pattern, not that he was paying them any mind. Bark dug into the bare portions of his hands where the gloves didn’t cover, pressed hard enough that it would leave imprints when he finally stood and left. He wasn’t sure how long that would be.
Breath in. Breath out.
Did he even have any right to breathe, he wondered idly. After all, none of his friends had gotten the second chance that he did. Did they even tell him that he was functionally immortal, before he died? He couldn’t remember, but that was hardly surprising. He remembered so little. But he has a feeling that they didn’t, because he can’t imagine agreeing.
Breath in. Breath out.
Unless, of course, they made the same offer to his friends. He doesn’t think they did, though, even if they had the power to. They didn’t save him out of friendship, nor love. They saved him because he was special . Because he was useful to them. His grip tightened further, feet swinging faster.
Breath in, breath out. Breath in, breath out. Breath in. Breath out.
His legs slowed again, his grip loosened. The joke was on them. He had a destiny, fate had a grand design for him, but he couldn’t remember exactly what it was. Sure, he had the big, overarching, capital G Goal, but it wasn’t like he had an agenda on how to do so properly. Others could only point him so far. But, he thought with a humorless smile, they couldn’t make him.
Breath in. Breath out.
He’d spent the past two hours chasing frogs. Before that, he’d caught a wild horse and soothed it, then decided to let it go rather than let it languish in a stable. At least one of them could be free of responsibilities. The past day had been spent picking herbs to season his meals and soothe his wounds. He braided a flower into his hair, only untucking it when he laid down on a pile of hides to sleep that night. Not a single thing of note happened, and he enjoyed it, until the guilt came back.
Breath in. Breath out.
The guilt was the only monster he couldn’t slay. Moblins and bokoblins fell like wet paper before his swords and arrows, but the guilt remained. Sometimes it hid in crevices and around corners, but it never stayed away for long. At night, it covered him like a blanket made of iron, crushing his ribs as he tried to get to sleep. In the distance, voices that he knew he didn’t remember cried out to him, begging him to help or lambasting him for failing. When he fell asleep, it was like plunging into a ravine.
Breath in, breath out. Breath in, breath out. Breath in breath out breath in breath out -
Link threw himself off the fallen tree, into the water below. It was a large river, calm, but cold enough to shock him out of his thoughts. A failsafe for when his mind inevitably betrayed him, for when his thoughts inevitably turned to everything he had done wrong, the misery that joy inevitably brought him. He broke the surface with a gasp, then began swimming back to the shore, hauling himself up while his brain played blissful static. It always took a second to reload when he dunked himself in the water, and he enjoyed the quiet discombobulation that followed.
He lay on his back, eyes mirroring the cloudless blue sky above him.
Breath in. Breath out.