Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Legend wasn’t an idiot.

He was many things: their veteran, a hoarder, a snark and a powerful magic user—but an idiot was not on his list. A variety of other labels could be attached to him—much to his dismay—such as secret softie and bunny , but he still wasn’t an idiot.

Out of all of his brothers and parental figures, Legend was the one who very rarely made mistakes. He was careful in battle, keeping to himself and the enemies he’d claimed as his own to defeat. Shots of fire and ice rarely missed, and his sword always hit it's mark. The only times he strayed away from his personal fights was when one of his brothers got themselves into trouble that they couldn’t get themselves out of.

Case in point: now. Right now, right this very second.

It was an ambush. Chaos was to be expected in the first few minutes of the battle, with everyone scattering and grouping into their usual teams—Time with Warriors, Wild with Twilight, Hyrule with Sky and Four with Wind. Legend, being the veteran with six adventures of fighting alone under his belt, tended to continue fighting alone. The only one who could keep pace with and keep track of his movements was Warriors, and the captain definitely preferred fighting alongside the smooth swordsmanship of their leader.

It was a group of various enemies from their Hyrule’s. Despite being in the depths of Four’s vibrant world, the enemies were anything but. Wild’s moblins of reds and blues and blacks flanked the varied bokoblins—Legend could identify Wind’s and Wild’s from the crowd—had come out of seemingly nowhere. Four’s stressed expression suggested that this sort of ambush didn’t happen often, and somehow got even more stressed when Time’s variant of Chu’s erupted from the ground below them. 

Legend separated himself from the rest of the Chain with practised ease, luring away a large group of bokoblins and moblins to an area where the trees surrounding him wouldn’t be at risk when he inevitably had to pull out his ruby rod. (He’d snatched it back from Warriors after he’d almost burned down Legend’s house. Bastard.)

Once he’d reached a distance he was happy with, he pulled out his ruby rod and held it tightly in his left hand, while brandishing his sapphire rod in his right. The auras of the conflicting elemental magic felt like static in his chest—the fire a burning, passionate pit and the ice a freezing, controlled sheet. 

It was wonderful.

Legend let loose the sheets of ice, his steps around the monsters almost seeming to be a dance that only he knew the rhythm of. They were all frozen solid in a matter of minutes, his sidestepping dodges and dramatic twirls coming to a stop where he began his dance of death. 

With the flick of his wrist, his sapphire rod was neatly tucked into his belt, the colder magic curling around his leg gently. Almost like Hyrule’s magic, if Legend thought about it—a gentle stream trickling into a wound. Though the sapphire rod was more of a blue-ish thing, rather than the familiar emerald green of his successor's magic.

Brandishing his ruby rod before him, Legend quickly dismissed the turn that his thoughts had taken. Identifying the similarities between magic was for another time, a time where he wasn’t in the middle of fighting for his life. Though… the monsters seemed pretty frozen. There was so little movement and noise that Legend could hear the way his boots scuffed against the grass as he took a few safety steps away from the group of monsters. 

He decided five steps was more than enough, and activated the ruby rod in the very next moment. An explosion of golden reds and oranges erupted before him, and Legend watched in delight as one by one, the monsters faded into black smoke. He ran a hand through his hair, content with his work once again. 

Then a scream penetrated the delicate ambience of the forest around him.

And that— that is right now. Trouble that his brothers couldn’t get out of.

Spinning on his heel, Legend shoves the ruby rod into his belt and bolts through the trees. He hit almost every branch he could have, with the branches snapping against his desperation and the long grass swishing against his boots and knees.

Who was that? Who screamed? Nobody screamed, not unless they or someone else was hurt. Legend pushes through the greenery, ignoring the cracking of twigs under his feet and the loudness of his breathing in his ears. It was too high-pitched to be Warriors or Time. Too childish to be Twilight or Sky or Four or Hyrule. That left Wind or Wild.

A yell penetrates through his panic, and Legend forces himself to a stop, snapping his head to the sound, the bones in his neck cracking with the force of it. In the distance he could make out Wild stood next to a singed Twilight. They both looked relatively unharmed if Legend ignored the growing red patch on Wild’s tunic. But if Wild was here, safe and healthy with Twilight, that meant the scream must’ve been…

“The Sailor!” Twilight yells, pointing in the direction that Legend had been headed. “He screamed. Somethin’ is really wrong, vet!”

Legend scoffs and begins his sprint again, flipping off Twilight with ease as he begins to clamber through the overgrown grass and greenery of the surrounding forest. Golden Goddesses, why was Four’s Hyrule so full of life?!

“No shit, wolfbrain!” Legend yells back, the panic lacing his tone giving away that he was genuinely worried. “It’s almost like I was running towards him!”

Luckily, he reaches the clearing that Wind and Four had migrated to within a minute. How they’d all become so separated was beyond Legend, but he was just thankful to see that Wind wasn’t dead. Four on the other hand—Four was leaning against a tree holding their arm to their chest, the bone bent in a way that really shouldn’t be possible. Wind stood in front of him, sword brandished threateningly at a Wizzrobe floating in front of them.

Shit. Shit.

He does a mental evaluation of the situation first. A proper one instead of one fueled by his panic—Four’s arm was broken. They’d need to get that treated. Wind’s tunic and trousers were torn and singed, probably due to the Wizzrobe floating before him, its robes a deep red. Fire, Legend recalls, thinking back to Wild’s impromptu Wizzrobe lesson a few months back. 

Blue ones have ice magic, Wild had said one night while making dinner, Wizzrobes. They’re weak to fire attacks. Red ones are fire, weak to ice or water. Yellow-green are electric. Not all that weak. I usually bomb ‘em.

A smirk appears on Legend’s face as he pulls his sapphire rod from his belt, the stream of cold transferring from his leg to his hand. The vapour exudes from it in small amounts, rolling and curling down his arm as he approaches quietly. He can barely hear the gentle brushing of his boots against the grass over his pounding heart. One step, two steps…

He lifts the rod and aims it directly at the Wizzrobe—and shoots off a blast of ice. It hits the damn thing square in the back, and it dissolves into nothingness before his very eyes. The only evidence of it existing was the weak imitation of his own rod clattering to the forest floor. Legend stares at it as he releases a heavy sigh of relief before turning his attention to Wind and Four.

“Sweet Din,” he curses upon approaching the duo. Wind had sunk down to his knees in exhaustion, leaving the top of his hair easy access for the veteran to ruffle fondly. Four was barely keeping awake—their arm was looking more and more fucked up as Legend grew closer. “You’re going to have to get the Traveller to look at that, Smithy. I don’t think I have a fairy on me…” Because he’d left his bag with Sky. And Sky was Hylia knows where.

“They’ll be fine, right Vet?” Wind asks. Legend turns to him with a start, and softens when the kid seems to have automatically crawled over to lean against him. “Couldn’t fuckin’ get to ‘em in time. Shitty fuckin’ Wizzrobes.”

Legend lets himself drop into a kneel in front of Four, and pulls Wind half into his lap. “They’ll be fine, won’t you Smithy?”

Four manages a slow nod and a weak smile. “It’s nothing I haven’t dealt with before, Sailor.”

Legend knows that’s not the right thing to say, judging by Wind’s sudden pale in complexion, but there’s nothing he can do except pull the kid closer while they wait for the others to find them. Moving Four in this state might cause the injury to worsen.

It’s only after a few minutes of peaceful silence that Legend hears movement behind him. Footsteps moving through the forest, light but dragged—a clear sign that someone was in pain. Yet something felt off. Something felt really off.

He gently manoeuvres Wind so the kid is in front of him before turning back to the unfamiliar sounds, and curses quietly when he spots another Wizzrobe dragging itself through the vegetation at the edge of the thick forest. Its robes are an alien colour—a pure white with accents of onyx black. In its hand was a long, stiff silver cane with the swirl of dark, malevolent magic burning at the end of it. What struck Legend as being particularly odd was the way it wasn’t floating— or rather bouncing around on puddles of magic. It seemed almost tired and outdone in the way it trudged through the grass.

That was until its gaze snapped to the trio—sending shivers down Legend’s spine at the lack of reasoning for it. There were no sudden movements or noises. How had it been alerted to their presence? And the stare, the permanent grin that was on its face. It wasn’t like the other Wizzrobes; they clearly enjoyed the attacks and attention, their smiles and eyes filled with mirth and joy. This Wizzrobe—this one was downright terrifying . No mirth, no joy were present in that expression. Only malice, malice, malice and undisputed hatred.

It lifts its arm—thin and twisted and wrong— and aims at them. Legend barely has a second to react when it shoots off a single shot from that ugly cane. He curls around Wind tightly, willing to take the shot for himself but not wanting the kid to get hurt in the process. He barely hears Four’s strangled yell as the magic makes contact with his back, and it burns.

They’re thrown far—Legend can tell by the air rushing past them and the painful thud as his back hits a distant tree. Dots of black invade his vision as his gaze darts around to look for Wind—and he spots the kid, thank Hylia, a ways off, but unharmed. That’s good.

He moves to stand, but his vision blurs dangerously into a staticky mess, forcing him to curl at the base of the tree uncomfortably. The burning in his back quite rightfully burned, and Legend felt his grip on consciousness fading quickly. A quick nap wouldn’t hurt, right? Four and Wind would wait for him to wake up, right?

Of course they would.

Chapter Text

Coming back from non-consensual unconsciousness is never really a nice experience; and in Legend’s own experience, of which he has a worrying amount, there are two ways of coming back to consciousness.

The first; jarring and bright and miserable , with everything and anything hurting—especially the things that you didn’t even know you had. Those always hurt the most . Healing magic is applied to any wounds, and red potions and green potions are forced down your throat whether you want them or not. And even then, after the pain and shock fades, there’s usually a dull ache—usually pulsing in your head—that refuses to go away for days and it irritates the living hell out of Legend. A headache on top of being busied around? There are few worse fates.

The second one is a slower return, with the ache building up as you fade in and out of lucidity, remembering and forgetting almost simultaneously. It could be described as drifting, drifting along a stream or something of the sort. Bobbing up and down in the water as you slowly wake up. The peak of the ache is the pain, searing bloody pain that you can’t hide your reactions to because you’re too weak. And still, healing magic is applied, red potions are downed, green potions are downed. It’s all like some sort of murky reflection of the first one. Even the headaches. Especially the headaches.

This time it’s a mix of them both. Rare, sure, and most definitely still unwelcome, but it’s different. Different in a way that doesn’t make sense. Like something is—

Perhaps we should get on with what’s happening, instead of worrying over this apparently different state of emerging from unconsciousness.

Legend wakes up with a start. He wakes to a dull ache in his back and wonders what happened. The grass is beneath his cheek, rough and prickly and oddly soft, but not in the cloud way. No, it’s soft in the my cheek is numb way. Well of course his cheek is numb. He’s been lying flat on this grass for who knows how long.

He bites the inside of his cheek, and it hurts. That rules out the soft in the my cheek is numb way theory. Why was it a theory? Because something feels off and Legend is going to make it everyone’s problem. There’s a buzzing in his head that won’t stop and it’s pissing him off because he can’t figure out the source of it.

Maybe it’s some annoying bug.

But that doesn’t explain the feeling of wrongness and the way everything feels so distant. Where had he been before this? Why was he on the ground with the shitty rough grass and his shitty not-numb cheek?

His mind is whirling around far too fast.

He needs to slow down.

Legend feels like punching something out of frustration, which isn’t too rare of a sentiment these days. The people he travels with are very frustrating and his patience can only run so thin. Like now, his patience is ever-growing thinner because he doesn’t know where he is, why he was there, who he was with—

“Smithy?” Legend hears a voice call, and it does an excellent job at tearing him from his internal confusion. The voice… The voice is familiar and it’s shaking and wrong and too young to be near here. His head snaps towards the noise and the thick fog rolling through his mind clears somewhat, along with the frustration. Somewhat.

Wind— Wind had said that. Of course, where the fuck had Legend’s mind been? He’d been protecting Wind and Four from that Wizzrobe. The weird one with white robes with black accents that, now that he really thought about it, looked positively ancient in their design. The Veteran knew the vague-ish accent design on all of his brothers’ clothes, signifying their eras quite easily if they ever landed near civilization, and he’d only seen that design in one of the old books in Skyloft’s library.

Old , old. Goddesses above, what in Hylia was it doing in Four’s era?

And where was it? Had it stayed to finish off his brothers who he was supposed to keep an eye on, or was it gone? Had it died? Oh—Well, Wind didn’t seem worried at all. It was probably gone. Legend would look for it later.

Shaking his head to rid the odd static that had started to build in it, Legend directs his attention to their youngest. Wind was kneeling next to Four, who was waving their hand at Wind dismissively and standing up carefully with his support.

They did wait for me, echoes around Legend’s mind, his heart, his soul, and he felt a warmth grow there in place of the emptiness he’d felt before.

He manages to stand, using the featherlight feeling of the tree he’d been thrown against as a support. With only the slightest stumble that he’s beyond thankful neither Wind nor Four saw, he begins to make his way over to them. Absently, he notes that he’s missing his sapphire rod and feels a tinge of panic in his chest at the realisation. Whatever. He’d find it later. The absence of his ruby rod doesn’t worry him nearly as much, because he convinces himself that Wind took it because Wind has always wanted to use it. Either that or Warriors still has it. (Despite Legend confiscating it. He’s coping, okay?)

Ignoring how faint the ground beneath him feels, Legend presses towards the pair on the ground. As Wind looks up from fretting over Four. Feelings of relief and joy bubble up inside him when he sees them unharmed, the confirmation that he protected them sitting comfortably in his heart.

“Where’s the Vet?” Four asks, hissing when Wind begins tugging them along. Must’ve caught their bad arm with the movement.

“I’m here, Smithy,” Legend says with a hint of fondness in his voice, giving them a little wave. How they hadn’t seen him yet had him worried—was there a head injury alongside the broken arm?

“He was jus’ ‘ere,” Wind responds lowly—to Four, confusingly. Were both of them… injured? After Legend had suffered that blast, they’d still gotten hurt? “I can still feel ‘im.”

“Sailor,” Legend starts hesitantly, taking another few steps forward, “Smithy. I’m here .”

Has his voice always been so muted? It sounded like a distant murmur to his own ears, bleeding with crackles and hisses. Almost like he was trying to talk to them through a torn veil—it wasn’t quite right. He’d chalked it up to a concussion that he’d reluctantly get treated once they met up with the others, but now he was starting to doubt himself.

“That blast sounded like it hurt,” Four murmurs. “It was a really loud buzzing sound, probably launched him further than it did us.”

“Wizzrobes di’nt shoot out bugs Smithy,” Wind admonishes, a frown on his lips. “The fire ones ‘re all like fwoosh-shrk . Ice ones ‘re all like crack-prck! And the lightnin’ ones ‘re all like bshwrck-k-k!” He throws his free hand—the one not supporting Four—around in appropriate gestures to accompany his enthusiastic onomatopoeia. “None of ‘em make buzz sounds.”

“I never said the buzzing was bugs. And… Anyway, what did it look like?” Four questions, a fond smile upon their lips “Maybe it was a bug Wizzrobe, you don’t know that.”

Okay, they both seemed relatively coherent. Legend takes another few steps forward, forcing himself in front of them. Wind was carefully lugging Four next to him, so they had to see him. 

Instead, they walk right through him. As if he wasn’t even there.

Scratch that, let’s backtrack— through him. Not stepping around, not stopping and jumping over. Through. Through. He hasn’t felt that violated before in his life. What the fuck. What the fuck.

“There ain’t such a thing as a bug Wizzrobe, Smithy.” They continue with their conversation as if nothing had happened. As if they hadn’t just walked through Legend without so much as a second glance. A single glance. Even the slightest reaction to that would’ve lessened the panic in Legend’s mind because at least that would’ve been some sort of indication that he was real.

He looks down to his hands, as people in situations such as these often do. In shock, or to make sure it happened, Legend isn’t quite sure. They’re transparent. Or—that’s not the right word— translucent. A cold grey-blue. And Legend was pale, he knew that, but not this pale. Not pale enough to see the ground through his hand.

Oh fuck. Oh fuck. A strong buzz fills his mind as he stumbles forward onto his knees. 

Was he real? What in the fresh Hylian fuck happened to him while he was knocked out? Goddesses, he hadn’t felt that violated in ages. It keeps echoing around his head, the way they both walked through him. Through him. Like he was nothing more than air. Was he air?

He’s not breathing properly—he’s not even sure if he needs to breathe anymore since people can apparently walk through him now. Was he air? Well, he’s assuming air can’t feel things and, despite it being the faintest touch in the world, he can . Take that air. One upped by Legend in this weird state that he still isn’t sure how he got into, but he’s coping. Sort of. He still can’t breathe. And he’s picking fights in his head with something non-living. Fuck.

What was that technique? The one where—yes. 54321. Five things you can, fuck it, he can’t remember the order, so let’s just go with see first. Eyes still work, albeit a tad blurred. Always good. Well, not the blurry part. The working part.

Grass. Trees. His knees—sort of. A pinecone. The sky. Does the sky count? If only the Sky was here, he’d absolutely count. He’s not though. Legend kind of wishes he was.

Right. Four. Touch. Yeah, that’s getting skipped. Not much touching in this state.

Rolling in with three sounds. It’s windy. He can hear the wind whistling through the trees. If he strains his ears, he can hear the faintest of yelling in the distance, because despite what everyone seems to think, his hearing is good. Maybe even Good. Capital G. It’s just selective. Or rather: he listens when the plan is Decent. Capital D. Which it rarely is, but hey, he doesn’t get told off as much when he goes off to do his own thing. As long as he takes ‘responsibility for his actions if someone gets hurt’ which, in his defence, only became a rule because of something that happened once, and that was when Wild yoinked his ruby rod mid-fire and got burned. And Legend got the blame for it. Ridiculous.

He breathes out slowly. He feels oddly better.

The next thing on the list is taste and, yeah, he doesn’t really taste much except the biting cold of the air. The panic he’d initially felt had passed through quite quickly. He’s just overthinking now. Overthinking and rambling to himself in his mind, because distracting himself is how he’s going to get through this. It’s going great, by the way.

He breathes out again, deeper and slower and it grounds him effectively. It also—that one felt a bit different. Like he was breathing out his energy, but he’s choosing to not dwell on that too much. Dwelling leads to panic and he does not want to deal with that without a Sky or Hyrule to comfort him, thank you very much.

Grass scratches and burns his bare knees when he’s cognitive; around enough to make sense of everything. Hay fever. Allergies. Instead of it being the worst thing to exist though, it’s oddly comforting. It’s like Hylia telling him that he’s still real, things are just a bit weird right now. Obviously he’d love to have some answers, but his knees getting a shitty rash from his allergies is good enough for now, he supposed.

Legend breathes again and feels a whole lot better because of it.

And then a voice pierces the second he’d had of tranquillity.

“Veteran?”

He looks up so quickly that his neck cracks. Ow.

Wind is looking at him. Well, not at him— perhaps directly through him, a bit to the left, would be more accurate, but it’s better than before.

“Sailor?” Legend tries to respond and, again, ow? His voice crackles and pops, a static sensation in his throat. That’s new. That’s new and he hates it. There’s so much static like this, in this stupid fucking state with its stupid fucking ‘rules’ that shouldn’t even qualify as rules. He hates it. It’s not pleasant. Sweet Din, it’s not pleasant at all. But Wind’s eyes light up at it, so it isn’t all that bad. Maybe he’s a bit soft. Maybe he’s distracting himself again.

He’d take the soft accusations over being exposed for his coping mechanisms.

The Sailor turns to Four, all smiles and enthusiasm. How the kid could stay so positive in this situation was beyond Legend. 

“Did you ‘ear ‘at?” Wind asks, and the way he asks it comes off as very insistent with an undertone of please tell me you heard that that would make Legend smirk if he wasn’t quite literally teetering on the edge of losing himself. Fighting with non-existence, some might say. Limbo dancing with the grasp of nothingness. And etcetera. You know how it is.

Four is shaking their head, which doesn’t bother the Veteran as much as it probably should. Sure, their youngest could somehow possibly sense him but—Oh. Oh, he’s staring at Legend again. Or, well, it’s a bit to the right this time. He’s doing his best, or something of the sort. Legend isn’t quite sure what he’s doing but it’s interesting and confusing enough that it's grounding him in some weird way. Only Wind could accomplish that. Only Wind. There’s something comforting in that. There’s been a lot of comforts lately. It really says a lot about Legend’s mental state, he thinks.

That train of thought promptly gets derailed. We deal with thoughts and feelings and emotions after we’re fixed.

If we get fixed.

“It’s gone now.” Wind frowns. He’s squinting at the vague area around Legend to the point where his eyes are definitely hurting and Legend wants to clip him around the back of the head to make him stop. It’s not good for young eyes to be strained so much. Too bad he can’t touch people apparently. “But it felt like our Vet. Does ‘at make sense?”

“Nothing you do or say ever makes sense,” Four deadpans, but does peer at the spot Wind was squinting at. A bit to the right of Legend. It feels normal… ish. Ish. “Does it still feel like him?”

Wind, relentless in his squinting, nods. It’s almost imperceptible, but it’s there. Thank Nayru . Legend can be sensed. Felt. He was still real. Something just happened to him and now he’s some weird spirit ghost thing that can’t really feel much or be heard by people. Okay. He can work with this. Totally.

“Sailor,” he tries again, and Wind lights up once more. Offhandedly, he wonders what changed to make his voice sound like this and become detectable to Wind. Maybe it was his… minor panic attack. Except it wasn’t really a panic attack; it was more of an overthink fuelled by panic which not only sounds cooler but also makes him feel better. However, regardless, back on track. Something had happened during it, feeling like a swift expulsion of energy…

Oh. When he breathed out that second time. The really deep one.

 That must be it, right? Something changed during that. That’s the key to figuring this shit out. “Can you hear me?”

“It's fuckin’ buzzin’ again!” Wind exclaims. He’s clearly fighting every bone in his body to not jostle Four around. Four, who was looking a lot worse than they did at the start of this conversation. They needed medical attention. Fuck. “I told ye, Smithy, I heard a buzzing. I’m sure it’s the Vet! I just don’t understand why it’s the Vet. It’s like a sixth sense…”

Legend gets to his feet. He worries at his lip and relishes in the sensation of sort of feeling it before approaching Wind and Four. “Sailor, if you used your two eyes to look to your left instead of at me, you’d see that the Smithy needs medical attention!”

He’s scolding and lets a fair amount of worry seep into his voice now that he knows the others can’t hear him—he doesn’t have to protect his dignity, or whatever. With only a moment of hesitation, Legend taps Wind on the shoulder closest to Four. To his surprise, his finger doesn’t pass through and instead makes contact, and grabs Wind’s attention.

He’d been aiming for a sort of spooky chill but that works nicely too.

“Oh,” Wind says eloquently when he finally looks down at Four. “Oh, Smithy, you needed t’a see our Traveller yesterday…”

Four manages a weak nod and Wind looks terribly guilty. He looks up to Legend with a small frown.

“If ye can hear ‘is, Vet, jus’ follow us back. Or… somethin’. I di’nt know where ye are, and I wan’ t’a look for ye, but the Smithy needs medical attention.”

His voice is small and quiet and hesitant. Legend hates it. It goes in the top ten things that he hates immediately before he nods to Wind’s statement. Request. Bit of both, really.

In a moment of impulse, Legend responds with, “I’ll follow” which gets a small smile from Wind before he lugs Four towards the yelling. It was steadily growing louder—the others must be close—but Legend spaces out to reevaluate everything he knew about the state he was in.

He could touch people, but they couldn’t touch him. Was that the trick?

I’ve decided to save you all from reading through Legend’s frankly awful thought process, which, if you were truly curious, was derailed about five times by the following: a memory of Warriors tripping over his scarf; the sky and longing for Sky, again; Wind making a terrible joke to lighten the mood and Legend having opinions on it; Four’s delayed response to Wind’s terrible joke; and Legend convincing himself that his coping mechanisms are perfectly healthy.

Don’t worry, he will address his emotions and will also be informed that refusing to process said emotions is, in fact, not healthy. Eventually.

The duo-trio of which the duo does not realise they’re a trio reach the rest of the Chain just as Legend finishes convincing himself that he’s fine and everything is fine. Warriors is by Four’s side instantly, taking them carefully from Wind and over to Hyrule. Hyrule sat against a tree with Time lying next to him. The Old Man looks miserable.

Forced bedrest, Legend assumes. A quiet quip from Twilight—“Lighten up, Old Man, it’s not the worst thing in the world.”—confirms his assumptions. Legend: one, everyone else: zero. Boo- yah. Alternatively, Time: zero , because the guy is always preaching about how important rest is after a bad injury and how you shouldn’t want to move and how it’s easier if you just accept it . Legend wishes he could ask him how his own medicine tastes.

Sky rushes over to Wind and starts fussing and Legend is not jealous at all. He finds himself fussing over Wind in a similar fashion, but not really. He’s checking the Sailor over for any injuries that he’d hidden (which is technically what Sky is doing, but Legend is being a lot faster and more thorough as he isn’t talking at the same time) and finds a particularly nasty bruise on his ankle. 

Legend contemplates for a moment. He considers the pros and cons and the lot. It’s a really long, thought-out thought process. Immeasurable patience. That’s what I’d say if I were a liar. If you think Legend has any semblance of patience regarding other people hiding injuries, you are sorely mistaken. It’s a split second decision.

Wait. What is ‘it’ again?

A shriek echoes through the woods, and the clearing his brothers had called camp falls silent. Oops. Listen, Legend hadn’t realised the bruise was that bad when he went to prod it! He thought it was a bruise! Not a broken ankle. Honestly, good. Wind shouldn’t have been walking on a broken ankle in the first place.

“What in the fuck was ‘at for?!” Wind yells out, glaring down at Legend, where he was crouched by his ankle. It’s surprisingly dead-on. Almost eye-contact, but Legend can’t see his reflection in Wind’s eyes. Creepy.

“Don’t hide a broken ankle,” Legend scolds, despite the fact that Wind can only hear buzzing. Still, the Sailor directs a powerful glare at him and rolls his eyes so hard that the Veteran is surprised his eyes don’t get stuck like that.

“Ye di’dnt have to prod it with yer icey hands,” Wind laments. Legend shrugs apologetically and stands, directing his attention to Sky. Sky looked a bit confused. Well, a lot confused, really.

“Who are you talking to, Sailor?” Sky asks politely. Now that Legend’s really looking at him, he’s looking at Wind with the sort of expression that Legend was all too familiar with. The one people gave him after he told them about Koholint. The we may need to put you in some sort of therapy? look. Legend scowls.

“The Veteran,” Wind clarifies. Four hums their agreement from across camp, which was still really quiet. Odd.

“Right,” Sky responds dubiously, “and what did this veteran prod?”

Wind side eyes Sky. Honest to Hylia side eyes him with so much judgement that Legend is weirdly proud of him. “Me ankle. Why did ye say Veteran like ‘at?”

Legend would like to know too, honestly. His nickname—or one of them, at least—is well-known and used more often than Legend is.

“Like what?”

“Ye said it like veteran ‘stead a’ Veteran,” Wind stresses. The difference is important. It’s like sailor and Sailor. Yes, both of them are technically Wind, but Sailor simply is Wind whereas sailor could be any random guy in a boat.

“Was I supposed to say it like Veteran?” Sky asks, this time saying it properly. Or, well, almost properly—there’s still the lack of familiarity in the word. This is getting weird. Legend doesn’t like it. Why is—What’s happening?

It’s just like earlier all over again. Confusion and frustration, he can feel them building in his chest. 

“Aye!” Wind exclaims. “Because he’s the Veteran . Do ye—What is wrong with ye? Yer actin’ off. Legend! He’s our Legend! Our veteran Link with all ‘em magical items an’ ‘is snark an’, y’know, he’s a secret softie but he’ll never admit it to our faces.” Legend resents that. “At least I’m pretty sure it’s ‘im. The details of ‘im right now are a tad fucked, but I’m ve’y almost sure. Did ye hit yer ‘ead?”

“I’m more worried about you hitting your head, Sailor.” And there’s Warriors. He steps halfway into Legend and the Vet has never moved out of the Captain’s space faster.

Wind is looking at Warriors like he’s crazy. “Why?”

Why indeed. You know—You know what a better ‘why’ question is? Why is Wars kneeling down in front of Wind with his I’m gonna tell you some news that will definitely cause you distress face on?

“There isn’t a veteran Link, Wind. We’re a team of eight, not… not nine. Who is Legend?”

The air grows cold. Still. Unmoving.

The question of how things could get worse had echoed around Legend’s mind for a while, but he’d never consciously thought about it. He thought he’d jinx it if he did.

It seems like he didn’t have to think about it at all. This is how things could get worse. 

And this was probably top ten. Top ten things that got worse. Worse than anything he could’ve thought of. Hylia above, jinxing things is the worst.

He’s really got to stop saying ‘worse’. It’ll start sounding like it doesn’t exist.

Like him.

Chapter Text

All things considered, Legend was doing surprisingly well right now. He can still hear, for starters. Yes, it’s muffled and distant and he can also hear the blood rushing through his ears, but he isn’t deaf, which is a win. He can also feel things. Specifically, his heart pounding in his chest. It seems to be threatening to explode. Not good, but on the other hand, feeling is a win. And lastly, his mind is certainly working.

Thought whirl around his brain, replaying what Warriors had said mere moments ago. Who is Legend? Who is Legend? Did all of this even exist?

He— he was Legend. He was the Veteran. He was Link, their ninth, their resident hoarder and magic user. He stayed calm during the shittiest situations and provided snarking comfort when needed. He wasn’t an idiot or cold or distant. He was Legend.

And he didn’t feel real.

Strangely, air seemed to be a bit lacking in his lungs. If he wasn’t real—if… Could he still feel pain? Was this just like Koholint again? No, no, it couldn’t be.

He tries to force himself to breathe because he’s fine, just a bit shocked at the realisation that he may not be real and that his brothers don’t even recognise him. Well, they might recognise him, but to recognise him they have to see him and that's a bit difficult right now. All logic has been thrown out of the window and—

Oh, for Farore’s sake, he knows he’s panicking. Legend is so painfully aware that he’s panicking but he can’t do anything about it. There’s nothing to grasp onto, nothing to ground himself with, because he’s not real. He isn’t real. None of this is real, is it? He’s just—he’s just floating along beside… What are they? Figments of his imagination, right.

It’s Koholint. The thought ricochets off the sides of his brain. It’s Koholint again. None of it is real.

He can hardly breathe. Deep down, he feels it in his soul—in their spirit—that he’s real, but he can’t tear himself out of this spiral he got thrown headfirst into. It’s nauseating. He feels trapped within the distress he feels.

One thing Legend had always prided himself on was the fact that he wasn’t claustrophobic, unlike most of his companions. It was a silly thing to feel proud of, but it set him apart. Didn’t make him better, obviously, because Hyrule wasn’t claustrophobic either, but he still felt good about it.

Right now, though, he feels like he knows exactly how the others feel whenever they’re forced to walk through a small space. Suffocated, unable to escape, stuck, trapped. It was worse than awful. He couldn’t quite grasp the word to describe it though.

Along with his gasps for breath he feels the weird energy escaping him again and feels inexplicably weaker because of it. He tries to hold onto it, to grasp it tightly and not let it go because it feels so important; he just doesn’t know what it is. His heart is still thundering in his chest and his blood is rushing through his ears, but he can hear an odd sound on the other side of the noise.

He latches onto it.

It’s Koholint. All over again.

As he focuses on the sound—the voice… And the way the soothing murmurs transform into soothing words… it keeps him afloat. He hadn’t even realised he was drowning in his panic. Breathing comes easier and everything begins to quiet down, leaving only the gentlest pulse in his chest indicating that he was still coming down from that experience. He feels exhausted, but can’t bring himself to sleep. Mentally drained, rather than physically.

Legend opens his eyes. He hadn’t even noticed that he’d closed them.

“Yer with ‘is, right?”

He blinks languidly, vision still blurred. That was… Wind. Wind was there, speaking in a low, quiet voice. Goddesses Legend felt like utter shit.

“Aye, I know. All fine, mind.” 

Had he said that out loud? Regardless, it wasn’t all fine. Or, was it? It couldn’t be, because he wasn’t real. But Wind could… Wind was talking to him, so maybe it was… Maybe…

Wind frowns and snaps his fingers in front of Legend’s face. “Quit that. Yer fine, Vet.”

“I’m not real,” Legend breathes out, clenching his fists tightly.

“Aye, an’ I’m a fuckin’ ‘blin. Git that shit outta yer head, y’hear? Yer jus’ as real as any o’ us ‘ere. Shit’s messy now, but we’re fine.”

Something in Legend begins to break down ever so slightly. “How can you be so sure?” His eyes feel wetter than usual. He rubs at them.

“A brother thing,” Wind murmurs cryptically. “Yer gonna be fine, aye? We’re gonna fix ye.”

Fix him.

Of course. Because he’d been cursed, affected, hit— something had happened and it broke him. Not in a bad way—or, yes in a bad way but he was genuinely broken. It wasn’t one of those moments where he’d say he needed to be fixed and someone would comfort him and say no this is normal, you’re valid because his current predicament was not normal and certainly was not valid. He was not having a good time.

But he was real. This was a curse. It was an effect from something—probably that stupid fucking Wizzrobe—but he could get through it. He was real. He was real.

Okay; he’s sorted. He’s not. He will be. That’s what’s important. His brothers will remember him, just like how Wind and Four do, and everything will be fine again. 

It’ll be fine.

Legend opens his eyes. He hadn’t even realised he’d closed them. Again. Second time!

Wind is looking at him. At at him. Legend shakily gets to his feet and raises his eyebrow. And Wind—Wind reacts as he normally would: mimicking the action with a small smirk before sticking his tongue out at him. The action seems a tad more awed, like Wind hadn’t expected to see Legend, but it still held the strongest sense of familiarity.

But as much as Legend would love to continue impressing Wind, or whatever the fuck was going on, he would also love some answers.

“You can see me?” Legend asks and, fucking ow. That’s definitely gotten worse. Fuck this expelling energy bullshit.

Wind nods. He’s doing a rather impressive job at ignoring the way everyone (except Four) is staring at him like he’s crazy. Legend wonders if he’s just that oblivious that he doesn’t notice, so focused on Legend that he doesn’t notice or if he’s had to deal with looks like these before.

His contemplation definitely shows on his face, because Wind shoots him a funny look that effectively communicates the feeling of you’ve never made that face before, please stop to the point that Legend feels almost offended. Like, wow? Okay? He’s suddenly not allowed to express emotions?

“Ye look like someone put salt in yer coffee,” Wind murmurs amusedly. 

“It feels like someone put salt in my coffee.” Legend misses the taste of coffee. He never thought he’d long for the taste of something so bitter, but here he was. I’ll tell you a secret—Legend doesn’t even like coffee. He’s much more of a tea person. Coffee just wakes him up and keeps him going until it doesn’t, which is excellent for his profession.

Despite him firmly believing there is nothing wrong with how he treats coffee, he’s also very conscious of never letting anyone else find out about it. He knows he’ll lose his coffee privileges; something he is never going to give up.

Hang on. Did Wind just reference how he looked as well as being able to hear him?

“An’ now ye look like a fuckin’—ah, shit… Like a ye, ah…” Wind trails off, chuckling softly. Legend finds himself smiling regardless.

Okay. Right. What he could figure out from this whole situation was that the more of his ‘energy’ that he accidentally keeps getting rid of whenever he panics, the more clearly Wind can see him. Why Wind could see him and not Four, well, that was a mystery for when the Smithy wasn’t suffering from a broken arm. Maybe Legend could talk to Wind about it at some point later, because he’s still getting stared at by everyone else…

“Wind,” Warriors starts and—ah. That is his Captain voice. “Are you sure you didn’t hit your head?”

Wind glances at him with a frown. “Aye I’m sure. Talkin’ to our Vet.”

“ Which Veteran?” Warriors asks desperately. Legend finds himself genuinely appreciating how patient and willing Warriors is to figuring out what’s wrong.

“Our,” Wind repeats slowly, as if talking to a child, “Veteran.”

Warriors looks back to Sky, who shrugs helplessly. Okay, maybe Wars wasn’t so patient and willing. Rude. 

Hyrule looks up from where he’d finished treating Four—the Smithy was now sleeping soundly—with a furrowed brow. He stands shakily, still feeling the after effects of the fight, and makes his way to Wind, pressing the back of his hand to the kid’s forehead.

Wind looks over at Legend before directing a confused glare at Hyrule. “What’re ye doin’, Traveller?”

“Checking for a temperature,” he responds dryly, pulling his hand away. “You’re not feverish…”

“I ‘ave a broken ankle,” Wind admits quietly. Hyrule curses to the sky and gets the kid to sit on the ground. Legend sits next to them, absolutely relishing in the way that Wind kept shooting him small glances. The ankle is fixed easily and a potion is shoved into Wind’s hands. He downs it easily.

When Sky appears by the three of them, Legend startles, because he hadn’t realised that the Skyloftian had moved. He had an odd sort of look on his face, one that Legend couldn’t quite figure out. All he knew was that it looked awfully out of place on Sky’s face.

Oh. They’d made a stupid decision, hadn’t they?

“Wind,” Sky starts, and Legend feels his heart drop. Those nicknames were only used if people were in deep shit. Oh, fuck. “The Captain and I were talking… about your veteran friend that you keep hearing.”

“He’s real,” Wind confirms lightly, drumming his knuckles on his leg. Hyrule, Hylia bless him, looks between the Sailor and the Skyloftian and promptly decides he does not want to get caught up in whatever stupid decision has been made, walking back to where Four and Time were lying down. "See 'im too, now."

“I’m sure he is,” Sky placates, dragging Legend’s rapidly diminishing attention to him once more. “How long have you been… seeing him?”

Wind scoffs, rolling his eyes. “Since ‘e fell out a portal, jus’ like all ‘a us. ‘Cept our Vet was pissed as all fuckin’ ‘ell.”

Sky exchanges an uneasy glance with Warriors. Legend frowns, heavier than before, as he tries to put the pieces together.

“Sailor.” And that’s Warriors taking over. This conversation is dragging on for an awfully long time. “Why didn’t you tell us you were… seeing people?” Legend could hear the silent question of how did we not notice? in his tone and feels himself pale, if that was even possible. Only the subtle glances from Wind were keeping him grounded right now. 

“Ain’t havin’ this bl’umin’ chat wi’ ye,” Wind mutters, standing and moving to collapse in his bedroll next to Wild, who was already conked out for the night.

He’s stopped by Warriors’ hand coming down onto his shoulder.

“We’re aiming for a town,” Warriors explains. “It’s just over a week’s walk away from here, if the Chosen remembers the Smithy’s place well enough. There’s… if we remember right, a doctor there.”

By the way Wind freezes, he catches on at the same time Legend did.

“I di’nt need t’a see a fuckin’ doctor, Cap. Medical or magical.”

“You’re seeing people who don’t exist,” Warriors says firmly. There it was. Shit. Shit. “And this might be normal for you—but we have to be sure, Sailor.”

“Wha’ fuckin’ part’a I ain’t seein’ a fuckin’ doctor does’nae make n’ee fuckin’ sense t’a ye?!” Wind exclaims, wrenching his shoulder from Warriors grip and scowling at him. If looks could kill, Warriors would absolutely be dead on the ground. Hylia above, Legend didn’t know the kid had it in him.

And still, Warriors barrels on like he hadn’t even spoken, “And listen, this veteran may be a comfort, but until we’re sure of what’s happening, I don’t want you to talk to it, okay?”

It.

“ He ain’t an it! And ye can fuck right off with ‘at.”

Warriors sighs. “It might be a figment of your imagination, or it might be something more malicious, Sailor. I only want to keep you safe.”

It.

“Quit callin’ ‘im an it!”

“Fine,” Warriors bites out. His frustration had reached its peak, it seems. That didn’t take long. “ Fine. Wind, you’re not to talk to him until we get you checked out.”

Wind’s defence immediately drops, his eyes widening as he processes Warriors’ demand. Legend can tell the kid had been focused on Warriors calling him an it that he hadn't considered the full picture of what exactly was happening. “Ye can’nae do ‘at.”

“Oh, I think you’ll find I can,” Warriors snaps, before drawing back and taking a very long moment to steady his breathing. “No talking to him until after we get you checked for any curses, or other things.”

“Ye can’nae do that! Cap’n, ‘e’s fragile. What if ‘e ‘as another panic attack? What if ‘e disappears?”

“Well,” Warriors says blandly, so clearly disconnected from the conversation now, “then there isn’t much we can do, is there?”

And with that he turns to tend to Time and Four alongside Hyrule. Legend feels his heartbeat pounding in his chest as Wind sends him a desperate look, but he can’t do anything about it. His brothers think the only connection he has to them is either a curse or the kid having a mental disorder that he’d failed to inform them of or that he wasn’t aware of. And Wind might— Legend didn’t have an issue with that at all, but way his brothers reacted definitely said a lot. Assholes.

Sky wraps his arm around Wind’s shoulders, and Wind tears his eyes from Legend as the elder murmurs something to him. Something too quiet for Legend to make out.

From then, Wind barely looks at him.

And that… is how it is. For about a week.

It doesn’t sound like a long time, does it? In the grand scheme of things, it isn’t really. One week; seven days. It doesn’t seem that long at all.

But during your weeks, you talk to people. People talk to you, people acknowledge your existence. There is banter, jokes, memories made. There’s eating, drinking, sleeping—all sorts of things that you sort of take for granted, in some cases. 

Imagine a week where nobody acknowledged your existence other than a few subtle glances from one individual. Imagine a week where you couldn't eat, drink or sleep. Imagine a week where you couldn't talk to anyone but yourself.

Legend felt his re-established grip on reality getting weaker as the days passed. It was difficult. It was difficult and he hated it and he wished things were different. He couldn’t even spend the hours of silence productively—instead trapping himself in a daydream until he felt Wind brushing his fingers through Legend’s shoulder; a simple, unseen gesture that served to ground him ever so slightly. 

And then, after that week, it changed.

Legend had never been more thankful for a change in his entire life.

Chapter Text

The night before they reached the town was a tense one. Wind was refusing to even look at Warriors and Sky, never mind talk to them. The only person he really talked to was Four. Everyone else was given similar silent treatment, despite them not contributing to Wind’s current anger.

Legend could understand it. He’d act the same.

He was beyond pissed at Warriors and Sky for suggesting those things about his little brother in that tone of voice and for making the kid seem like a problem. It wouldn’t fucking matter if Wind could hear voices, and he shouldn’t have been treated as a child—no, as an issue for possibly having those problems.

And what’s worse—they didn’t even give Wind the chance to elaborate or explain. What the fuck was up with that?

Legend had been working through those emotions during the week. He’s pretty sure his anger has only grown, but it’s not a lashing-out anger anymore. It’s a quiet anger that will result in multiple scoldings, passive aggression and the silent treatment when Legend is back to normal.

When.

He looks up at the night sky, melancholic, yet a hint of light shines in his eyes. Every night had been so lonely since the argument. Usually, Legend would’ve sat against a tree and stared blankly at a random spot until Wind stirred.

However, this night was different to the rest. Four was forced to do second watch after being deemed ‘healthy enough’ to do so, with Wild also claiming that they ‘got to suffer through the night as revenge for missing watch for a week’. Twilight hadn’t been happy with that comment, though, and Wild was dealt with accordingly. Legend isn’t quite sure what happened, but when the two of them came back, Wild looked exceptionally more messed up than usual.

Whatever happened out there looked effective. When Legend was fixed, he’d have to ask Twilight what he did.

Anyway, back on track—this night was different, yes.

During his bout of drifting in and out of coherency, he’d overheard Wind and Four muttering about talking tonight, with Wind occasionally grandly gesturing to Legend’s bag that he’d taken from Sky after the first night—the incident —and claimed it as his own. The rest of the group had taken it as fact and not tried to confiscate it, but Wind had promised to not use anything in the bag unless it was an emergency. Those gestures and the fact that he’d heard his name and seen the subtle wink that Wind had thrown his way made Legend’s chest fill with relief.

They were going to finally talk and figure everything out. Thank Hylia.

Twilight had taken the first watch. Legend watches from his place next to a dozing Wind as he shakes Four awake. The Smithy is up quickly; quiet, reassuring whispers being said to Twilight before the Rancher nods and goes off to collapse next to Time. He looked exhausted.

Legend stands and walks over to Four, doing a quick double-tap on their shoulder to let them know he was there. They respond with an amused huff and tap the ground in front of them in the same rhythm.

One thing he’d noticed was that Four had mimicked Wind’s actions throughout the week. Not talking about Legend at all, that is. Legend hadn’t been quite sure why—he honestly thought they’d forgotten about him too until he heard them muttering to Wind. Maybe Wind had told them to stay quiet, or they just sensed the mood and didn’t risk saying anything.

The lack of talk to fix Legend amongst the rest of the Chain would’ve been a clear indication that things weren’t as they should be.

It’s only small things like taps on the shoulders and responding taps that made Legend aware that Four still remembered him. Legend only had the confidence to do that once before tonight, so it didn’t really count. But small murmurs to Wind in the dead of night about properly discussing things—about what to do—had acted as an anchor to Legend’s mental state.

All of that, combined with the fact that Four had been drifting in and out of lucidity due to their injury for most of the week, was enough to placate Legend.

He was ready to leave that state of being ignored, however. One week was more than enough.

“Vet?” Four murmurs, tapping the ground once.

Legend responds with a single tap to their right shoulder using his left hand.

“Do you remember the non-verbal, non-sign tapping method we developed for the Captain and the Champ?”

Legend pauses before tapping Four’s shoulder once: yes. Two taps were for no, three taps were for unsure. There were others—like tapping in a certain rhythm meant something and tapping in a different rhythm meant something else—but those were saved for only Time and Twilight. Four also knew them, but that’s because they were scarily observant. But back with only Time and Twilight knowing: it was stupid, but Legend didn’t really mind. He wasn’t as close to Warriors and Wild than those two were.

“Good, that was a yes, right?”

Legend taps once again.

“Okay. Should I wake up the Sailor now? So we can talk about what to do?”

Another single tap, and Four is on their feet with a bounce in their step that has been missing for so long. They crouch next to Wind, eyes sparkling red with excitement, and shake his shoulder gently.

He’s up and crashing his forehead against Four’s in an instant. The resulting crack makes Legend wince in sympathy as they both try to keep their exclamations of pain near-silent.

It takes a rather amusing moment of them both fumbling around, clutching their foreheads, to make their way away from the camp, but they get there eventually. Legend sits himself against the log that Wind had also leaned against. His bag was resting against Wind’s legs. Four sits opposite them, by the dying campfire, and smooths down their tunic.

Legend snickers quietly at the way Wind sips a small amount of red potion—where he got it, Legend had no idea—to lessen the pain of the bruise forming on his forehead. He passes the bottle to Four, who mimics the action with a small sigh of relief. Against his will, a fond smile makes its way onto Legend’s face. Dorks.

“So,” Four murmurs, shuffling even further away from the camp so as to not bother anyone— Twilight specifically, as the rancher was the most likely to be disturbed, having just finished his watch, “we should start with something simple. How has the Vet been coping, Sailor?”

Wind looks to Legend expectantly. Legend hugs his knees to his chest tighter and stares through his translucent knees, a ball of anxiety forming in his chest. All previous glee and excitement was gone. “I’ve been fine.”

“Says ‘e’s fine,” Wind reports, keeping his voice quiet. “Di’nt believe ‘im, mind.”

“It’s just been different.”

“Different, ay? Bad different?”

Legend simply hums and nods. He didn’t want to dump his issues onto Wind, no matter how insistent the kid was. He was still a kid after all. A very capable kid, of course, but a kid nonetheless.

“A bad different, then?” Four confirms. Legend perks up at the little notebook they had resting in their hands. Each page seemed to have a title—he assumed they’d ask questions and jot down notes. Unfortunately, it was written in their Hylian, which Legend couldn’t read fluently yet. Only Hyrule’s and Time’s came easily to him. Everyone else’s were still a mystery, for the most part.

“I’m sorry we di’nt really talk to ye,” Wind says, averting his eyes from Legends immediate piercing gaze. “Di’nt  gi’me ‘at look. I am sorry. It’s jis’—”

“The others,” Four mutters, their eyes the same colour as a storming sea: a deep, dangerous blue. Lighting was so weird when it came to their eyes. “Captain and Chosen specifically have been giving you the eye all week. It’s been irking me.”

“Couldn’t chat t’a ye much, Vet.”

Legend sighs and pats Wind’s shoulder gently. “Ain’t your fault. I have some choice words for ‘em when I get the ability to yell at ‘em again.”

Wind smiles awkwardly and repeats the message to Four when prompted with a raised brow. Four’s face immediately darkens and Legend prepares himself for the onslaught of anger from their shortest member.

“The way they handled it was disgusting!” Four exclaims—quietly. “Even though I was halfway to dream world, their tones were awful.” They turn to Wind with an apology in their eyes. “I haven’t had the chance to apologise for not speaking up sooner, Sailor.”

“Ain’t the end o’ the world, Smithy,” Wind placates easily. “Ye was out’ta it, anyways. Couldn’t’a asked ye to come t’a me aid, ‘s bad manners.” He pauses for all of a second before tacking on a rushed but sincere: “Forgive ye, mind. Di’nt worry.”

Conflict resolution is always so sweet. Legend smiles fondly at the two, allowing himself the opportunity to enjoy the moment before diving back into the issue at hand, headfirst. 

“Smithy, do you have any ideas why the others don’t remember me?”

Wind translates. Four tilts their head.

“Yeah. Leading theory is that, since we might’ve also gotten hit by the blast from that Wizzrobe— the start of all our problems—we’re kind of in with whatever has happened to you.” Four blinks. Legend swallows. “Which is what we should focus on, you. Can you tell the Sailor exactly how you feel, see, etcetera—what you are?”

Sighing once more, Legend opens his mouth to respond, but Wind beats him to it.

“Looks a tad like a spirit, but not as dead. Di’nt get ‘is wrong, ‘e’s still our Vet , jis’ a tad see-through-y an’ blue-ish. Hand is fuckin’ cold as all shit, mind. Yeowch.”

“Thank you, Wind,” Legend deadpans. He is secretly happy that Wind described what he looked like though; Four was jotting down notes like there was no tomorrow.

“Which hand?” they ask, a lot of interest in their voice. “Because whenever he’s tapped me, it’s been weirdly warm.”

Wind glances over to Legend. Legend perks a brow and reaches out with his right hand to tap his knee. By Wind’s slight wince, it was cold.

“Right one.”

“Okay, Vet, can you tap the Sailor again with your left?”

Legend shrugs and reaches out to tap Wind’s knee with his left hand. The kid’s eyes widened in awe. “Woah!”

“What?” Four says excitedly, crawling forward. “What did it feel like?”

“Warm! Jis’ like ye said!”

They high-five. Legend watches in disbelief. Had he been subconsciously tapping Four and Wind with an assigned hand or something? He’d been tapping Wind with the colder hand— why it was cold he had no idea—and Four with the warmer hand. Huh.

“Any ideas, Vet?” Four asks, directing their gaze to the vague-ish direction of Legend.

Legend hums. Did he have an idea? Hot and cold hands was a weird effect of being turned into a spirit, was it not? Why would that…

Oh. Oh!

“My rods!” he exclaims excitedly, a burning buzz in his throat—because that made sense! He’d brushed off his rods being missing at the start of this whole mess, but they were with him the whole time! Why they (maybe) gave him some sort of hot and cold hands was a completely different can of worms that he was not opening right now, but at least there was a maybe reason for quite a few things. If Four had an idea, they could ramble about it to their heart's content, but Legend wasn’t touching the reason himself with a five foot stick. “My element rods. I had ‘em, got zapped and then didn’t have ‘em.”

“Woah!” Wind exclaims, eyes bright with excitement. “Do’s ‘at mean ye ‘ave badass fire an’ ice powers?!”

Four looks at Wind like he’d grown a second head. Legend smothers a giggle at the way they pinch the bridge of their nose with an energy akin to that of Time’s disappointed glare. “Some context, Sailor?”

“Smithy looks like they’re about to lose their shit, Sailor,” Legend teases. Wind visibly pales and tells Four what he’d said in the most monotone, report-like voice that Legend had ever heard.

“So your fire and ice rods?” Four murmurs. Legend nods despite the fact that they can’t see him. “No dice. I have no idea why that might’ve happened. Sorry, Vet.”

Legend shrugs and leans forward to pat their head. He didn’t mind. A lack of answers didn’t bother him as much as it probably should. He was more interested in— “Any theories on why the others don’t remember me?”

“Good ques’ion, ‘at is,” Wind mutters. “Asked why them lot di’nt remember ‘im. Reckon it’s ‘cause the spell, or what-fuckin’-ever, makes ‘em forget?” He leans forward to rest his elbows on his legs and his face in his hands, squishing his cheeks together for a moment before resting on his chin. His brows were drawn together as he continued. “Di’nt know why exactly them lot di’nt remember but I fuckin’ bet it’s t’a d’ee with all this spirit shit. Somethin’ fuckin’ daft like ay ye want’a be turned into a fuckin’ spirit an’ forgotten? Mustn’t’a all worked ‘cause yer still ‘ere an’ I ca’nt think why.” He blinks and sits up properly again, glancing between Legend and Four wildly before adopting a sheepish grin. “Jis’ a theory, mind.”

“Just a theory?” Four repeats incredulously. Legend can get behind that. Wind’s explanation made a lot of sense. The only unanswered question Legend had was why the Wizzrobe would use it and, well, he knew he wasn’t getting an answer, so he kept quiet while Four and Wind bickered.

Huh. He didn’t get turned into a full spirit-thing (because he can’t be an actual spirit. He wasn’t dead. Even half-spirits were all-dead). Assuming the best case scenario—it was probably the disgusting amount of protective charms, items and jewellery he had on him at all times. That and, maybe, the fact that he’s been hit by so many curses over the years that he’s become immune. Or, half-immune. That didn’t explain the weird energy that escaped whenever he got too stressed or panicked—feeling disconnected from himself. That…

Huh. That’s… probably the reason why it escapes, actually. Legend just didn’t know what it was. 

Another thing—why could Wind see him?

“Sailor,” Legend says, cutting through whatever Wind was saying to Four, “why can you see me?”

Wind turns to him with a forced smile. Four looks appropriately confused for all of five seconds before a look of understanding appears on their face. Legend wondered what it looked like to Four—for Wind to abruptly stop mid-sentence and turn to a seemingly empty spot next to him.

“Pro’ly was, uh, closer to ye,” Wind says, slowly averting his eyes to the star-filled sky. “When ye was hit. With ‘at zap.”

Legend narrows his eyes. “The truth, Wind.”

Wind presses his lips together. A minute or two passes before he lets out a long sigh and turns to Legend. “Second ‘venture. Somethin’, somethin’: spirits! See ‘em now.” He jabs his thumb at Wild, fast asleep next to Hyrule. “Champ used t’a ‘ave a few followin’. Near the start. They’re gone now.”

A bolt of ice makes itself at home in Legend’s chest. So he was a spirit. He’d been hoping, quietly and to himself, that he wasn’t one. That he wasn’t dead. But he was.

You can’t bring back dead things, and he had to be dead, right? How else is someone going to become a literal spirit? Wind specifically said spirits—that he could see spirits, so he has to be a spirit. He has to be dead.

Legend was dead.

“Vet,” Wind says, snapping his fingers in front of Legend’s face. “Yer cryin’…”

Swallowing back a loud sob, Legend rubs at his eyes and finds them to be slightly damp. Oh, great, you can’t escape emotions as a spirit. In death. For Farore’s sake…

“Hey, hey…” Wind soothes. “It’s all fine, Vet. Yer okay. I’ve—I got ye.”

“I’m dead,” Legend chokes out.

“Fuckin’ what? Ye—Where the shit di’ja get ‘at fuckin’ idea? Y’ain’t dead!”

Four sucks in a sharp breath. Legend blinks at Wind. “Spirits are dead.”

“Most, aye,” the youngest concedes, glancing uneasily between Four, Legend and the others. “Most can be dead. Not—not yerself, mind. Listen—yer… yer more like a weird ‘alf spirit thing. Like a disconnect or transformation ‘stead’a dead . If ye asked our Traveller or our Old Man I guarantee they’d say ye reek of curse magic. So—so yer not dead. Ye’d know if ye was.”

And that—oh. He wasn’t dead. He wasn’t dead. He wasn’t. He’d cling to that reassurance for as long as he could.

Breathe.

Okay. Alright. He can get through this. For Nayru’s sake—Legend has decided he hates curses and will not be interacting with them for at least a month after he’s fixed. Goddesses be damned if a curse even tries to fuck with him, he’s pulling out his entire arsenal to fight it. Too bad he can’t interact with all of his goddamn items. He shoots a longing glance at his bag by Wind’s feet.

“How can this be fixed?” he asks in lieu of giving Wind a response. The kid looks a bit put off, but shrugs and turns to Four. After a silent moment, Legend has to bite back a laugh at the unimpressed look Four shoots at Wind and the confusion Wind sends back.

“What?”

“I’m assuming he said something,” Four deadpans. “Care to share, Sailor?”

“Oh,” Wind says eloquently. “Wants t’a know how t’a fix ‘imself.”

Four furrows their brow. “I’m not entirely sure… We don’t have access to any information, such as libraries or archives, that could figure out what exactly is wrong. Not right now at least. Maybe when we make it to the next town... I might be able to get into one of the libraries to check.”

“What’s wrong?” a familiar—oh, too familiar voice says from in the shadows. Four visibly flinches, hand flying to the sword on their back while Wind pulls out a dagger from Hylia-knows-where with a startled yelp.

Legend just turns to the voice—to Twilight, who wasn’t asleep, apparently—with a conflicted frown.

Just how much had he overheard?

Chapter Text

It happens so quick.

Wind’s dagger shooting towards Twilight very nearly ends up embedded in the Rancher’s knee.

“Woah!” Twilight raises his hands in surrender and takes a half-step away from the trio. Wind scowls at him and shoves his dagger back in its scabbard—which sat just around his waist, under his tunic. Four lowers their hand back onto their lap and frowns at Twilight, who at least had the audacity to look a bit guilty for sneaking up on them. “...Good reflexes.”

“What do you want?” Four asks bluntly. They seem put off by Twilight just showing up. Legend is… conflicted. Twilight had obviously overhead at least some of the conversation, but he wasn’t snapping or expressing distaste for it, unlike some people. If anything, Legend would say he looked intrigued, if not a tad worried.

The Rancher lowers himself to the forest floor, onto his knees, and he toys with a dead leaf between his fingers. “I overheard y’all both…” And then he pauses, just for a moment, casting a curious glance at the area around Legend before correcting himself with, “…or, you three talkin’ over here.”

Wind freezes for all of a second before brandishing his dagger again. “An’ what fuckin’ of it?”

Twilight raises his hands again; his eyebrows were drawn together, with the skin on his forehead wrinkling ever so slightly, distorting the tattoo, and his eyes flashed with confusion. “Things ain’t been right. There’s been some sorta change and… and it’s buggin’ me.”

Four gestures at Wind to put away the dagger with a stern look, which Wind complies with after a nudge from Legend. He watches Twilight, hand poised over the dagger, as the Rancher shuffles a bit further forward, but ultimately relaxes when he doesn't sense an immediate threat. Though Legend could understand Wind’s distrust, it upset him that everyone was so broken up and separated from each other. They shouldn’t be like this.

“Could you elaborate, Rancher?” Four inquires patiently. They have their notepad out again, quill in hand and ready to take notes. It was seeming more like an interrogation now, as opposed to the light conversation from before.

“Well, it’s like I said,” he starts, going along with the questions. Legend had to do a double-take because of how fast it was going. How willing Twilight was. Had he missed those who doubted Warriors and Sky? Had he missed their whispers and odd looks, or doubtful glances? “Things ain’t been right. Ever since that ambush—it’s felt like we’ve missed… been missin’ somethin’. And things have… changed.”

“Things ‘ave absolutely fuckin’ changed. Great observ’tion,” Wind mutters petulantly.

“Let him speak,” Legend scolds. “You can complain about him all you want later, but we should listen now.”

Wind looks to him and crosses his arms with a quiet huff, but doesn’t say anything else on the matter. Twilight looks at Wind oddly.

“You heard—”

“You mentioned a change?” Four interrupts smoothly. “What sort of change?”

The Rancher crossed his arms with a sigh. “Traveller’s been more withdrawn, Captain is actin’ more like a captain. I feel like he’s missin’ something, y’know? I’ve been thinkin’ about it, an’ I don’t know howta fix it…”

“Thing ‘e’s missin’ is our Vet,” Wind says in a delicate and hesitant voice. Legend notes how his hands were shaking and rests one of his own—the warm, the left—atop them both and squeezes before offering Wind a supportive smile when the kid looks at him.

“Our Vet,” Twilight repeats faintly. “Is… Are they next to you? Your… Vet?”

Glancing at Legend, then at Four who had paused in their writing, Wind looks extremely shocked by Twilights entirely accurate placement of Legend. Him and Four seem to have a mental discussion with each other, consisting of increasingly ridiculous eyebrow movements, before Wind rolls his eyes and looks back to Twilight. Legend sighs inwardly. 

“An’ what if he is?”

“I can sense somethin’ there, an’ all,” Twilight explains, gesturing directly at Legend. “Did he speak earlier? I heard... buzzin'. Anyway, it was… Naw, is an ability from my… adventure. It ain’t as strong in this form, but…”

Legend perks a curious brow. Was Twilight talking about Wolfie? Of course, the Veteran had repressed the memories of being turned into a pink rabbit by Twilight’s shadow crystal, but that didn’t mean he’d forgotten that the Rancher was Wolfie. What exactly was Twilight getting at?

“Ask him if he’s talkin’ about what I think he’s talking about.” Legend nudges Wind insistently. Wind scowls, swatting away Legend’s cold hand, but does.

“Does your Vet know?” Twilight asks hesitantly. “About…” He gestures at his shadow crystal, making sure to not brush against it with his bare fingers.

“Yes.”

“Said yes,” Wind reports. Legend mutters something else under his breath, but Wind manages to catch it. “Also said t’a get o’er yersel’ an’ get on wi’h it.”

With a put-upon sigh, but a small, nervous smile on his face, Twilight lifts his hand to the crystal on his necklace and closes his fingers around it. Wind yells as his body becomes engulfed in dark shadowed magic, shrinking down to the familiar size of a certain wolf before the particles explode around him. Wolfie stood awkwardly where Twilight had once been.

Four shrugs at the transformation, like they already knew about it, and Wolfie shoots an unimpressed look at them. Wind, on the other hand, stares at him for a solid minute, unblinking, before turning to Legend.

“Ye knew this?”

“Yes. It’s a long story, I’ll tell you another time.”

“I di’nt care about the fuckin’ story—ye knew?!”

Wolfie barks, catching Legend’s attention. Wind snaps his head to him, giving up on interrogating Legend.

The wolf was staring directly at Legend. Directly. None of the vague area bullshit, or just to the left or the right. It was directly at him. Creepy.

“Hey, Wolfie,” Legend greets. Wolfie startles and boofs, trotting over to Legend curiously. He sniffs at the air and tilts his head to the side in confusion. Legend feels his hopes for Twilight remembering him diminishing ever so slightly. “I’m guessing you don’t remember me, huh.”

“Must’a be’n from bein’ near the spell then,” Wind comments, reaching out to run a hand through Wolfie’s fur. The wolf pays it no mind, unlike his usual reaction of snapping playfully at the kid to get him to stop. “Rememberin’.”

“Twilight doesn’t remember him?”

“Nah. Ain’t a single thought behind ‘em eyes is there, Wolfie?”

Wolfie boofs, clearly offended, but shakes his head. The poor guy looks devastated that he can’t remember. Legend understands why. Twilight was the resident worrier of the group, and he’s clearly feeling some sort of connection to Legend; some sort of recognition that doesn’t make sense to him. Half the time, Legend felt overwhelmed by how much Twilight cared about each and every one of them, but right now he just wanted to drown in it. He wanted nothing more than to be in Twilight’s arms, comforted and warm.

Everything was so cold now.

“You should probably change back,” Legend advises quietly, ignoring the way Wolfie’s eyes get sad and pleading. “I’ll still be here, Twi.”

One final bark echoes through the camp as the same wave of black shadowy particles covers Wolfie and then there appears Twilight, sitting comfortably, still staring at Legend. His eyes are trained on the spot where Legend was sitting, but there was no focus in the eyes. Just a blank stare. Fuck. Fuck, Legend doesn’t think he’s seen Twilight this upset ever.  

“You wasn’t lyin’, Sailor,” Twilight murmurs hollowly. “I’m awful sorry for not stickin’ up for you with the Captain and Chosen.”

A small smile appears on Wind’s face. Content. “Quit ye worryin’, Rancher. Forgave ye.” He glances away. “Know what ‘ey say. Forgive an’ forget.”

Twilight hums, finally tearing his eyes away from Legend with a strong air of reluctance. He toys with the thread attached to his crystal, fingers moving erratically; almost like he wanted to shift forms again. He didn’t though, not immediately, and Legend hoped he didn’t while he got an explanation.

“Who is he?” Twilight asks. He turns to Wind and then to Four. “I should know who he is. Yous said a spell. Why can’t I remember ‘im? Why does he seem so familiar but not?”

Four raises their hands in a placating manner. “We’ll explain everything one question at a time. Hold your horses, Rancher. We’ve got all night; the Sailor’s watch is next, and is the final one.”

“Y’all were plannin’ on not sleepin’?”

“I got four ‘ours in!” Wind snaps defensively. Four shushes him. The four of them tense at movement from the camp, but at Twilight's sigh of relief, it was clear that nobody had woken up. His hearing was the best of all of them, after all.

“Four hours ain’t nearly enough and you know that, Sailor.”

“Mother ‘en.”

“Enough!” Four snaps. “We’re not going to get anywhere with you two bickering.” They turn to Twilight. “Ask your questions so we can get on with it.”

“Who is he?”

“Legend?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, he’s Legend,” Four responds easily. “He’s our Veteran. Been on six adventures, has an arsenal of items you don’t want to mess with—I don’t even think we’ve seen half of them. He wears a bunch of rings, prefers elemental rods over swords. That doesn’t mean he’s bad at using a sword, no… I’d say he’s one of the best of us wielding one.”

“Legend,” Twilight repeats. “Legend. Were we close?”

With a pained smile, Four looks to Wind, and Wind looks to Legend. Oh, so he got to share that little tidbit of information. The wind rustles through the trees in the late night breeze as Legend starts speaking. Wind repeats his words dutifully.

“We weren’t really close. You’ve always been closer with the Old Man and the Champion. I am… or, was, closest with the Traveller, then Chosen.”

Twilight seems content with that answer, oddly. Legend supposes finding out someone you can’t remember isn’t as close to you as you feared was a good thing. Or, maybe not a good thing but, the blow of not being remembered would be lesser if you’re not as close. Well, it was lesser until Twilight looked positively distraught by not remembering him. Ouch.

“How did he… an’ by extension y’all become like…” He gestures in Legend’s vague direction. “… That.”

“It’s a long story—” Four starts, before getting abruptly cut off by Wind.

“Wizzrobe. Stupid fuck-off, arse’ole Wizzrobe ‘ho was all like ay ye wanna be forgotten an’ a fuckin’ spirit?! Right at our Vet. Fucked ‘im up with one of them stupid spells and turned into half-spirit thing.”

“Eloquently put, Sailor,” Four remarks dryly.

“Got the point to ‘im,” Wind responds proudly, pointing at the look of terror on Twilight’s face.

“A Wizzrobe did this?”

“We haven’t quite figured it out.” Four winces, patting Twilight’s knee. “It’s looking very likely that it was the Wizzrobe, though. We just don’t know the spell that caused it.”

“Magic is so shit,” Legend complains. Wind snickers.

“Aye, but we’ll fix ye yet, Vet! Jis’ gotta—”

A loud whirring interrupts Wind’s sentence. Legend clamps his hands over his ears to block it out, but it vibrates deep within his soul. Over the sound, he hears Wind yell out and Four hiss, but he’s far too focused on keeping the pressure over his ears to keep it away to pay them much mind. It burns his insides, tearing into the outer edges of his soul with a strength he’d never thought possible.

Was he dying? Goddesses, he must be, because he’d never felt anything hurt as much as this. He knows a low keening sound escapes his throat, but he can’t make an effort to stop it. It hurts, it hurts, it hurts.

He couldn’t die . Not now, not ever—he had so much left to do, so much left to see. He had people to live for, he—he couldn’t abandon them. Yet his soul felt like it was being torn apart piece by piece; the roaring fire doused by a tsunami of ice-cold water, fighting for its life. What was happening?

It burns and it burns and it burns until it stops. Abruptly, with no warning. Legend is still curled over himself, clutching at his chest. There’s a dull throbbing deep within himself, but the pain is mostly gone. He opens his eyes with a small groan and sees Wind staring at him, which… Fair.

But what worried him was the way Twilight was fretting over the kid. The kid, who was leaning heavily against the Rancher in a way that screamed exhaustion. Four was being held up by Wild—when had he gotten there?—while the familiar scarf of Warriors stood behind the two as the Captain observed the other side of the clearing they’d settled in. With another burst of pain, Legend turns and sees a portal, swirling and dangerous.

A portal.

A portal made him feel like he was shattering?

“Vet?” Wind whispered hoarsely. Legend looks over to him. “What ‘appened?”

“I don’t—” he feels his words catch in his throat. “I don’t know, Sailor.”

A fearful look crossed Wind’s face, and Legend tore his gaze from him back to the portal. Why—why had it…?

What was going on?

Chapter Text

Despite the initial agonising experience of the portal opening, going through it wasn’t as bad as Legend had expected it to be.

There was no pain stepping through, after everyone had been woken up and they’d all collected their things. Beforehand, Wind, Four and Twilight had kept to themselves, with Wild hovering and shooting odd glances at the portal when Twilight eventually explained things to him (with the permission of Four and Wind, of course). He seemed confused at the whole thing, but still apologised to Wind on behalf of Warriors and Sky even though he had nothing to do with their behaviour.

Legend still had to talk to Wind and Four via Wind (and probably Twilight and Wild, now that they were in the loop) about the burning, the pain, the feeling of his soul being torn apart (and if they’d experienced the same), but it was far too chaotic to sit down and converse properly then. That did not, however, stop Legend from making the most dramatic complaints about everything to distract himself from aforementioned negative experiences.

When Warriors had shot an odd look at Wind as he’d used Twilight as a support, Legend had loudly proclaimed that “The Sailor isn’t my mirror shield, Captain!” which had Wind giggling into the Rancher’s shoulder.

“I truly believe that Hylia doesn’t give two shits about us,” had been muttered when Wild and Four tripped over an exposed tree root on the way to the portal, followed by a quieter, “Maybe she does, a little…”  when Wind had shot him a funny look. How was he supposed to know the kid wouldn’t be happy with it?

And just before stepping into the portal, with only Wind and Twilight remaining, he’d told them—or, mostly Wind— “If I die, tell Warriors his hair sucks and I’m goin’ to haunt him until he dies, which is when I’m going to boot him in the shin.”

The response to that one wasn’t as positive as he’d expected. Wind did not look happy. He quickly amended his statement with “Okay, I take it back. I’m just haunting him. End of. And kick his shin for me, Sailor.”

That one got an amused smile back on the Sailor’s face. And then he and Twilight had stepped through, leaving Legend alone with only the forest, the stars and the pulsing portal for company.

It was beautiful out tonight. Legend hadn’t noticed until just now. The stars were dim, yet seemed so bright in this moment; twinkling above him with persistence and light. He often found himself wondering what they were doing out there. Were they supporting life like their own star? Were they different? Were they the same? 

You’re procrastinating, a traitorous voice whispers in the back of his mind. He brushes it off with a sudden shake of his head.

The forest was lively too, and he observed it with a focus that was odd, considering he’d been staring into it every night for the past week. The leaves shifted in the breeze, dark shadows being cast on the trees. Occasionally, a bird would chirp or a critter would dash through the bushes. It hadn’t changed at all.

The voice came back hissing, Delaying the inevitable helps nobody. Legend found that quite rude (and refused to admit it was true).

After a moment, he finally tore his gaze from the nature surrounding him and looked directly into the portal. The portal that still hadn’t disappeared. It hadn’t forgotten him, even though everyone else had.

Mocking swirls of purple and pink and black all glow before him, casting his translucent figure in a weak imitation of the colours. With a hesitant glance down at his hand, he grimaces at the way it reflected it. A weak tug in his chest told him it was time to go, lest he be forced in, but he still waited. He stared at it, daring it to act out again, daring it to tear his soul apart.

It didn’t change. Its magic was static. Legend furrows his brow and takes a small step towards it. Maybe something else had caused the pain?

He brushes his fingertips through the veil and feels nothing except the delicate brush of the covering on his skin. A confused hum vibrates in his chest. Well, better to get it over and done with than procrastinating more.

And, yeah. Despite the initial agonising experience of the portal opening (if it was even because of the portal opening), going through it wasn’t as bad as Legend had expected it to be.

In fact, it wasn’t bad at all. It was high on his list of nice portal travels. For the longest time, he thought nothing could beat the smooth transition of going from Lon Lon Ranch to his own cottage, but this one was a good contender for the title of ‘Adventure #7: The Nicest Portal Journey’. He’d have to think about it more when he had the chance.

As he steps through the portal and onto the other side, the first thing he registers is the sheer amount of green in his vision. Bright green, like Four’s forest had been during the day. It must be daytime, wherever they are.

Legend glances around, ignoring the unfamiliar prickling on the back of his neck as the portal snaps shut behind him. It wasn’t often he was the last one through. Everyone was there, safe and uninjured. He does a mental evaluation of everyone before anyone gets the idea to make a plan to start moving.

Time looked fine; he was fussing over Four, who was doubled over and breathing steadily. Motion sickness, they’d mentioned early on in their adventure. They didn’t deal with portals well at all. Legend could relate, some of the time. Motion sickness sucked.

Warriors and Hyrule stood awkwardly at the side of the group while Sky made quiet conversation with Twilight, the Rancher gesturing between the Sailor, the Smithy and the now-disappeared portal. Wind was chasing Wild around the clearing; Wild looking more alive than he had in a good few days.

“You’ll never catch me, Sailor!” Wild yells out gleefully, launching himself over a fallen tree before scrambling up a standing one. Wind follows with only a slight stumble and begins heaving himself up after the wildling.

An annoyed groan escapes his lips. “Quit jumpin’ around an’ get back ‘ere, Champ! Ye pilfered me dagger! How did ye even know where I were ‘idin’ it?!”

Wild snickers and dangles the dagger just out of Wind’s reach. “This dagger?”

With one self-assured yell, Wind jumps for the dagger and grabs it by the blade. Legend can already see the blood dripping down the kid’s hand as he rushes forward in a blizzard of worry. He senses Hyrule close behind him as he kneels next to Wind, who was seated on the grass below the tree with a rapidly paling face and his wrist clenched tightly.

“For Farore’s sake, Wind! Why would you jump for the damn thing?” Legend demands. Wind looks up at him with wide eyes.

“Wasn’t thinkin’…” he murmurs, flinching when Hyrule crouches next to him and grabs his hand, his own already glowing a delicate green. “Tried t’ forget you wasn’t through yet. ‘s been ages, Vet. Thought you—you was gone. For good. Distracted m’sel’.”

Ages? He’d only been delaying the inevitable for a few minutes, right?

“How long has it been?”

Surely he hadn’t been admiring the sky and the forest and trying (and failing) to pick a fight with a non-living portal for too long…

Wind simply shrugged. “Ain’t been quite an hour…” Hyrule shoots him an odd look as he heals his hand. Wind averts his gaze, “Not a short while, mind. Maybe not ages. Might’a been exaggeratin’ a bit.”

“What’s that for?” Hyrule asks as he rocks back onto his heels and stands up straight.

“Portal,” Wind says bluntly, “wonderin’ ‘ow long it’s been open. Or— was. ”

Hyrule gives him another odd luck, but Time beats him to the answer before he even opens his mouth.

“Twenty minutes, give or take. We’re in the Champion’s Hyrule.”

Twenty minutes?

“Does ‘e know where we are?”

Hyrule shrugs. “Maybe?”

“Sailor, I’m so sorry.”

Wind looks taken aback, and after a quick smile sent to Hyrule, he’s on his feet and walking off towards Four with a small gesture to follow. Hyrule looks a bit confused, but accepts it and walks off in the opposite direction, most likely to wrangle Wild or lean against Sky.

Legend, on the other hand, follows Wind. He has nowhere else to go, after all.

“Ye needn’t say sorry, Vet,” Wind murmurs. “The portal w’s different. Perfectly natural to be ‘esitant.”

“You were so distracted with—with worry that you got hurt.” Legend crosses his arms, his shoulders hunching up to his chin. “I shouldn’t have taken so long.”

“But—”

“No buts,” Legend cuts in easily, directing an easy smile at the kid when he turns to face him. Wind’s own eyes were bright with confusion and gratitude. An odd combination. “I’m sorry.”

“A’ight,” he mutters, turning back around and waving to Four, who was looking a lot better than he had before. Time must’ve left them a while ago, because the Old Man was standing next to Sky, engaged in a quiet conversation that left Warriors on his own. A burst of satisfaction exploded in Legend’s chest at the sight. Oh, he couldn’t wait to give Warriors a piece of his mind. “I’m sorry for not bein’ careful.”

Legend perks a brow. Wind quickly continues, “Equal now. No debt.”

“No debt,” Legend agrees, after a moment.

Four is buzzing with energy when the duo eventually get to them, clearly prepared to launch into some sort of elaborate theoretical explanation about the portal and whatnot, but they’re cut off before they can even start by Wild’s yell.

“The portal’s gone! Can we go now?”

Time calls out from the other side of the clearing, amused, “Do you even know where we are, Champion?”

“Obviously!” Wild stands with his hands placed firmly on his hips. His usual garb had been replaced since the last time Legend had seen him; he was now wearing a much more comfortable-looking tunic and pair of pants. His hair was also pinned up neatly into a bun. “We’re near Hateno.”

“And how long will that take?” Warriors asks impatiently. Legend glares at him, opening his mouth to respond snarkily, but Wind harshly shushes him before he can. Lame.

“The walk to Hateno’ll only take a few minutes! Tops!”

“Is that with or without distraction?” Twilight crows teasingly.

The group all laugh at that, and set off on their way.

As it turns out, when Wild tells you that the walk up was only going to be a few minutes, he really wasn’t lying. They were at the gates to Hateno within five minutes, according to Time, and there had been much rejoicing. Thank Hylia that he and Hyrule didn’t get distracted. The wonders of knowing where you are and what exists in the area, Legend supposed. Or perhaps the pressure to lead the group to safety. It was rare that Wild ever got that responsibility.

During their walk, since he was leading them, Wild couldn’t drop back to talk to the ‘in-the-know’ group who were hovering awkwardly behind everyone else, so he sent Warriors, Time, Sky and Hyrule off to scout ahead and buy things they’d need from the local market before dropping into step beside Twilight.

“Your best bet,” Wild starts abruptly, pointing at the building atop the hill at the far end of the village, “would be going to see Purah. She’s more of the science type, but I know for a fact she has books and notes on ancient magic.”

“How exciting,” Legend drawls out. A science type wasn’t likely to believe their tale. If those with the literal Hero’s Spirit couldn’t break through the curse, why would this Purah person be able to help them? But… Wild trusted her, and Wild didn’t really trust anyone unless he’d spent quite a bit of time with them, so she was worth a shot.

“Also,” Wild continues, lowering his voice despite nobody being near them, “I think the Captain is lookin’ for a healer of some sort for our Sailor. There are people, but I’m gonna head off to get ‘em to lie to him. If he doesn’t catch on, you’ll have all the time you need to talk to Purah.”

“Thank you, Champion,” Four says kindly, beginning the trek up with a violet sparkle in their eyes. Legend runs a hand through his hair and follows, chuckling to himself when Wind trips over his own two feet to keep up with his sudden departure.

“Don’t trip, Sailor,” Legend reminds, “ because we don’t want another injury without Hyrule here.”

“Already apologised for ‘at,” Wind mutters. Four looks back with a frown.

“Apologised for what?”

“Grabbin’ me dagger by the blade ‘stead ‘a waitin’ ‘til I got it back.”

With an amused huff, Four simply turns around and begins to hum an unfamiliar song. Wind perks up slightly, humming along at a marginally different pitch. A familiar song to them both, but not to Legend.

Odd. Must be a descendant thing… perhaps.

He often found himself wondering where they all fell along their pasts and futures. Of course, they’d figured out Sky was most likely first. Wild was the most recent, if the state of things was anything to go by. Hyrule was Legend’s successor— that much was clear by the way the kid recognised him by his stories almost immediately after meeting him. There was some sort of weird connection between Time and Twilight that had Legend assuming they’d figured out one was the successor of the other but they hadn’t shared it with the group.

But the placement of everyone else? It was anyone’s bet. With records being improperly stored, stories growing into nothing but myths as the centuries passed, there was no clear indicator of a definitive timeline for them all. Yes, Time was likely Legend’s successor, if the stories of the child hero he’d grown up harbouring negativity towards held any truth to them, but then how did Time also being Twilight’s successor work?

It didn’t make sense.

“Is this it?” The voice of Four snaps him back to reality. Somehow he’d subconsciously walked up the entire winding path up to the building atop the hill. The wonders of the human mind.

“It’s a buildin’, ‘at’s for sure,” Wind says, skipping towards the door with an energy that Legend hadn’t seen in a while. To be fair, he found himself feeling quite excited. He was finally getting fixed—or, that’s what he was hoping. Hugs, holding hands, being remembered. It sounded like a dream come true.

Four and Legend follow Wind into the building, only to come face-to-face with a very young girl. Was that—was that a child? Was this the Purah person that Wild was talking about? The science type with books about ancient magic was a child?

“Linky? Is that you?” the young voice exclaims. She stands before them, hands on her hips and goggles over her eyes. She pushes them back with an air of distrust, revealing narrowed eyes. “You’re not Linky…”

“We’re friends,” Four explains briefly. “We’re friends of Wild—or, Link. You must be Purah, right? He told us you might be able to help us? Regarding what we believe is a curse.”

“I’m Purah, yes. A curse?” she confirms. There was an edge of something to her voice—something that startled Legend out of his doubts. She knew what she was doing, despite the whining tone of her following statement. “Linky knows I’m not good at curses. You’d be better off seeing Impa!”

“The Champion told us to come to you ,” Wind butts in, gesturing around in the way he usually did, “we need yer help, even if yer not the best. ‘e needs it…”

Purah looks at Wind and then at Four, before pulling her goggles back down and looking at Legend. “Is your ‘he’ the little half-spirit you have behind you?” She lets out a childish giggle at Legend’s startle, and the way his eyes widen, waving at him. “I can see you!”

“Me?” Legend asks incredulously, looking around as if there was another half-spirit standing next to him. Obviously, there wasn’t.

“I can’t hear him,” Purah says, pouting as she turns back to Four, “because that’s a whole other thing to deal with! But I can see him. Is he cursed?”

“How can ye see ‘im?” Wind asks desperately, hands fisted at his sides. “I can see an’ hear ‘im. The Rancher can see an’ ‘ear ‘im, but only—only…”

Purah’s expression turns contemplative, but she shrugs. Ah, that was the look of someone not willing to share any of their secrets. “Magic has a really funny way of working. It’s why I hate working with it so much! Science has rules. Magic does not.”

At Wind’s defeated ‘oh’, she pats him gently before rushing off to grab a few books from the shelf at the back of the building. 

After a tense moment, Purah returns with a book, old and battered and muddied with age. Four’s eye twitches. She pays the movement zero mind as she carefully flips through it.

“I completely forgot what the curse was, but I took a guess at the book!” Purah tells them cheerfully.

“He got turned into a spirit,” Four explains bluntly. “Or, a half-spirit, as you said. It was a Wizzrobe that did it…” They perk up and take a sudden step forward. “And I think it was dark magic. You see, a lot of dark magic hates it when a slightly different, uh, flavour of darker magic tries to interfere with the afflicted dark magic. When the portal showed up, well, its primary magic type was darker magic!” Which, since when? Legend would have to ask Four about that, because he was functioning with the knowledge that the portals were brought by Hylia, not a darker presence. Though, it was odd that they weren’t the typical golden-white of Goddess magic. “And we three got affected badly by it—the Vet most—so I believe it’s a darker magic.”

Oh, that—that actually makes sense. It must’ve been why he felt that agonising pain. The magic of the curse had either fought against or been attacked by the magic of the portal. Oh.  

“You’re smart, kid,” Purah responds simply, an edge of pride in her tone. Four flushes under the praise.

“Ask her if she has any ideas,” Legend prods, poking at Wind. Wind does so, reluctance in his tone. The Veteran only felt a little bad.

“I hadn’t heard of a curse that could turn people into spirits until I read this book!” Purah holds it up like it had the answers to life, and the universe in it. Legend… genuinely thought it might. “And even then, I’d need to read it more. The translations I have for it are a teensy bit off, because this was written during the era of the chosen hero, we think.”

“Did you say the chosen hero?” Four asks. “We have someone who might be able to help with translating.”

Purah looks up at them with a glimmer in her eye, “Oh?”

And that is how Sky ended up standing in Hateno Ancient Tech Lab, after having been forcibly dragged up the side of the hill by a desperate and excitable Wind. Wild had followed, out of pure curiosity, and was now lounging idly on the table, over all of the random papers and books strewn across it. After Wild had journeyed up, Twilight had trailed in after him five minutes later, saying that Hyrule and Warriors were being distracted by Time, who’d thankfully caught onto the fact that something was up and they—namely Warriors—needed to be kept away from whatever that something was.

Small mercies. Small mercies.

“Why am I here, again…?” Sky asks hesitantly, hands fisted in his sailcloth tightly. He seemed so out of place with people he’d normally fit right in with. From where he’d grown comfortable leaning against the table next to Wild, Legend frowns. Nothing was right anymore… Goddesses, why wasn’t he more careful? If he’d dodged the blast, none of this would’ve been happening.

“We just need you to translate something!” Four exclaims, their tone excited but painfully forced. Sky offers them the slightest tight smile, taking the book that had been thrust in front of him with an ‘oof’ .

“Which part?” Sky inquires patiently, eyes scanning the muddied, ruined page with an odd sort of concentration. “It’s older than what I’m used to reading. I might mess up a few words…”

What? What? This curse—the curse, the maybe fix, whatever the fuck—predated Sky? Legend thought Sky was the first, the Chosen by Hylia, the start of the cycle. That Skyloft was the first. Of course, of course—there must’ve been some sort of civilization before Sky—but the fact that Legend hadn’t even thought about that; it had him reeling.

“Older…?” Four mutters to themselves.

“Older,” Sky confirms, regardless of the fact it wasn’t aimed at him. He places the book down next to Legend on the table, running his index finger lightly over the first legible line. “We—or, I—learned this at school, luckily, but it’s much older than a lot of scriptures I read. Older than that is… interesting. Preservation does wonders, I suppose. It hails from a time before Skyloft, which is odd to think about, but the scriptures exist with a vague history.”

Well, colour Legend the brightest shade of shock you can find, because that’s what he’s in right now. Hours spent reading through the books in Skyloft’s library—his hunger for knowledge of the ancient past being easily satiated by the long, gruelling hours of learning how to read Sky’s Hylian to then translate the books. There was a reason he’d primarily stuck to books about fashion, after all. They were mainly pictures.

“So, what does it say?” Wild prods, literally poking Sky in the arm.

Sky looks rather pale, all things considered, as his eyes continue to scan the page. Out of curiosity, Legend leans closer and peers down at the various symbols and signs, finding it extremely difficult to differentiate between the letters and diagrams scattered across the page. He gives up after a few seconds.

“This is talking about a spell,” Sky starts shakily. “A spell, or a curse now that I’m looking at it, that has the capability to trap the afflicted in…” He pauses. “This part isn’t a direct translation, but it loosely means a spirit realm. So, a spell that traps the afflicted in the spirit realm. It—It says here: the spell keeps the soul of the afflicted trapped, causing it to break down, or deteriorate, into nothingness and cease to exist.”

Legend feels his heart jump to his throat. What?

“Even if the afflicted escapes,” Sky continues, “all will forget them. Resulting panic or upset will trigger the loss of—” He scoffs, leaning forward towards the book with a scowl. “That’s not even a real thing. It got disproven…”

“What’s it?” Wind asks. Worry painted his tone a gentle, yet vibrant blue.

“Life energy.”

Life energy?

“It says here,” Sky continues, oblivious to Legend’s sudden epiphany. “that if the afflicted escapes, all will forget them. The resulting panic or upset will trigger the loss of life energy, which will slowly return them to their inevitable end.” He finishes there, with a finality that buzzes around the room for all of a second before it fizzles out into a tense silence.

Panic, upset…

His moments of panic. Legend’s moments of panic. The indescribable presence, that important thing he’d tried to keep hold off—that was his life energy. His literal life.

And he had lost it— was losing it, might still lose it.

Everytime he freaked out, lost control of himself, felt himself slipping away, he was getting pulled into a spirit realm. To deteriorate and cease to exist.

He couldn’t panic now. He could not panic now. Legend wasn’t an idiot. He was many, many things, but he was not an idiot. He knew what he had to do to keep from losing more. Stay grounded, stay with it, do not panic and lose more of the thing literally tethering him to reality.

“But ‘en why—” Wind starts, before cutting himself off with a loud hum. Everyone’s heads turn to him, but his eyes are solely focused on Sky. “Would ye believe me if I told you our Vet got hit by this spell? This curse?”

“Your Vet…” Sky repeats quietly. He looks back down to the book with contemplation, the guilt evident in his eyes already proving to Legend that he was going to believe them. “I think I do. Goddesses, Sailor, I’m so sorry for the way I’ve acted… And to your Vet—to the Vet, Legend—I’m awfully sorry too.”

Legend reaches out to Sky, tapping his fingers to the Skyloftian’s left wrist in a simple, slow pattern.

Tap-tap. Tap. Tap-Tap.

Their own code, much like the yes-no code that Wild and Warriors used. Like the one he’d used with Four. It was more complex; there was no yes and there wasn’t a no, but there was I’m okay and It’s okay and Stay calm.

As the gentle rhythm of It’s okay dances against Sky’s wrist, his eyes widen minutely. After a moment, he looks down to his wrist with a look that Legend had only seen at funerals. Guilt. Sadness. Mourning.

“We’re gonna get him back,” Sky whispers reverently, his gaze snapping from his wrist to the book.

“We are?” Wind says, confused but hopeful. “You really believe us?”

Sky’s eyes move up to meet Wind’s in a way that could only be described as a determined frenzy. “I have zero knowledge of tapping codes. I don’t remember establishing one with anyone, but when an invisible force taps the rhythm for It’s okay on your wrist—” He cuts himself off with a choked laugh. Incredulous, but fond.

Wind whoops and immediately twirls Twilight around, whose eyes glisten with amusement and joy as he picks up the Sailor, spinning him. Wild lifts his arm with a thumb up, and Legend notices Four bouncing on their toes.

Sky remembered. Sky remembered. Albeit it wasn’t much, but it was enough. Enough for him to believe them. Enough for them to help them.

Despite it all, Legend finds himself smiling. He was going to be fixed.

He was going to be back.

Chapter Text

It’s official. Legend hates this curse.

“So there’s no explicit cure?” Four asks, leaning over the book and glaring at it with a look that could kill, if looks could kill. It was surprising that it hadn’t burst into flames from the heat in their gaze. “Or is it something else?”

“I didn’t say there wasn’t a cure,” Sky refutes immediately, running his finger lightly under the words. “I said I didn’t know what it meant.”

“We still ain’t figured out,” Wind calls from where he’s ended up lying flat on his back on the table, “why I couldn’t see our Vet, and ‘en I could.”

Purah is running around with various rocks and crystals and contraptions as he says that, and she comes to an abrupt stop, turning to him. Half of the things in her arms clatter to the ground. She pulls her goggles down and stares at Legend. It was still so unnerving.

“Did you escape the spirit realm?” Purah demands, dumping the rest of her things on a nearby stool and stomping up at Legend, her arms crossed across her chest.

“No,” Legend mutters, opting to sign alongside his words and praying to the Goddesses that Purah could understand it. “I got hit by the spell, got thrown against a tree and then woke up.”

Purah hums and walks up to Sky, jumping up to turn through the pages of the book until she lands on a page that has her slamming her hand down on a double page spread. Sky peers over her head with an expression of interest. The guilt from earlier was almost entirely washed away, now that the knight had something to do and prove his worth.

“That should say stuff about undoing curses,” Purah explains briefly. “Those silly books are never in order!”

Sky makes an ‘oh’ sound and begins running his finger under the words again, muttering under his breath as he translates.

“I bet this could be fixed if we just fucked with time.”

“What would fuckin’ wi’ Time do t’a ‘elp?” Wind asks incredulously. Somehow, the kid had ended up perching on Twilight’s shoulders while the Rancher read through the one book that was in his Hylian.

“Not the Old Man, Sailor,” Legend groans, pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes. “The concept. Seconds, minutes, days, hours.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” Legend mutters. “Oh.”

“We can’t mess with either,” Four says absently. They were combing through another book on the table. It was resting on Wild’s stomach as the Champion dozed off. “Time or time. It’s too risky.”

“Lame!” Wind bemoans, draping himself over Twilight’s back. To his credit, the Rancher doesn’t move any more than the bare minimum to shift into a more comfortable position, while still supporting Wind’s weight. “Maybe messin’ wi’ our Old Man will help instead!”

“Don’t mess with the Old Man, Sailor,” Twilight murmurs distractedly.

“Ye’re no fun,” Wind complains, peering over Twilight’s shoulder to nose at whatever he was reading. “What’s this about?”

“Flowers.”

“Oh!” Sky exclaims, jumping up and pointing at his book. Legend startles, almost falling from his perch. Wind does fall off Twilight’s back, Wild almost jumps off the table, which causes Four’s book to go flying. “That’s what that word is!”

“What?” Four demands, grabbing the book they were reading. “What word? What have you figured out?”

“This! Oh, Smithy, I got the fix!”

The fix? The fix? It was as simple as getting Sky to read a book for an hour? All of this— no. Legend exhales smoothly through his nose. He has to keep his emotions under wraps. They’re so close, so close. Only a bit longer, and then he can let out everything he’s feeling. He’s convinced himself this state he’s forced himself into won't have lasting effects, because why would it? (But look at how long it took for him to lose the indifferent front in the first place.)

Everyone is gathered around Sky by the time Legend snaps back to himself. A sigh escapes his lips, unbidden, as he looks over at the commotion. Bubbles of excitement build in his chest, but he forces them down. Now was the time to focus.

“So, the fix?” Four asks impatiently, tapping their fingers erratically on their arm where they were crossed. 

“I’m just making sure I’m definitely right with this,” Sky soothes, his tone firm yet soft, leaving no room for argument. The Smithy falls quiet at Sky’s silent request. “I can tell you it mixes a few things…”

The wait is tense while Sky checks over the words. Even Purah seems anxious.

Silence is broken after a moment or two.

“From what I can tell, there are three aspects to this cure, of sorts,” Sky starts, “but it’s not really labelled as a cure.”

“Wha’s it as?” Wind asks.

“I don’t know the direct translation to Hylian—just that it’s not exactly a cure. Don’t worry, though! It’ll work the same way. There’s no doubt in my mind about that.”

“Three aspects?” Twilight reminds patiently. Sky looks sheepish as he ducks his head forward in apology. 

“Yes, three aspects. There are aspects of life, aspects of memory, and aspects of energy. The ingredients, so to say, are vague.”

Vague ingredients were never good. Legend felt his nerves increase almost immediately after Sky’s words escaped his mouth. He taps the table behind him absently. What if they couldn’t find the ingredients? What would happen then? Would he end up ceasing to exist? Would Wind and Four forget him too?

“We don’t know if they’re vague unless you tell us!” Wild complains, already scrolling through his slate. Legend blinks and exhales; a careful, controlled motion.

“Let me get there!” Sky argues. as if he hadn’t just paused dramatically in his report. Legend rolls his eyes. “The life ones are just… pictures of plants. Wild, do you recognise any of these?” He’d hold up the book to Wild, pointing to a cluster of small sketches on the page.

Everyone cranes their neck to look at it, not just Wild. Legend ends up looking over Wind’s shoulder. There was a picture of some sort of flat-top mushroom, shaded a dark colour on the top, a weird-looking carrot that sprouted off into two parts, along with what looked to be an amaranth, but a bit off. There was also some weird heart-shaped radish; the only pop of colour on the page. A light, pastel red.

Legend feels like that should mean something.

While everyone else is looking over the aspects of life or whatever they are, Wild has his slate on his lap as he scrolls through it rapidly. From where he was standing, Legend couldn’t quite make out what the Champion was looking for, but by the expression on his face, he seemed like he had the answer.

“Shit!” he curses after a moment. Four turns to him first, brow raised.

“What?”

Wild shoves the screen of his slate in Four’s face. The Smithy leans back and peers at it, before their eyes light up. “Oh!”

“What’s that?” Twilight prods, plucking the slate out of Wild’s hands with practised ease that came from months of being an older brother to the Champion. Wild whines in protest, but makes no move to grab it back. “Oh, that’s… weird.”

“What’s weird?” Sky asks confusedly, peering at Wild’s slate.

“All those ingredients…” Twilight murmurs, swiping through the different pages with an odd look on his face. “For bein’ all that old, the curse… This fix has ingredients from this era.”

“You know how time works, Rancher,” Four mutters distractedly. They’re scribbling down the shapes below the plants. If Legend had to guess, he’d say they were some sort of spell circles.

In one easy motion, Sky twists the book back to himself to skim over what is assumed to be the next line of text. Wild hums and rushes out of the door, whispering something about not having enough endura carrots. Whatever those were. The telltale sound of him teleporting permeates in the sudden silence as Sky runs his finger along the words.

Seems like Wild had that figured out. Now, what was the next ‘aspect’?

“The next part,” Four says quietly, gesturing at their vague drawings that they’d been copying from the book, “is just a spell circle, right? The aspect of memory.”

“Yes,” Sky confirms, looking up at Four through his fringe. Legend taps his fingers against the desk as Wind glances between the two confusedly.

“There’ll be specific translations that I’ll need,” Four continues, snapping their notebook closed with a crack! Sky hums and nods, closing the book he was holding. Wind, again, glances between the two in utter confusion. “We can ask Purah where we can set it up.”

“Got it,” Sky says, humming lightly as he ruffles Wind’s hair. “Get your Legend prepared, Sailor.”

“What?” Wind demands, finally breaking out of his stupor. Twilight pushes himself off the table to stand next to the kid. “What’re ye on about?”

“The third aspect,” Sky explains, flushing slightly at the dirty look Twilight sends him. Legend snickers. “is of energy. It’s a vague description, but what I could pull from it is… It’s Legend’s want to return, essentially.”

“Will be easy,” Wind announces, full of childish confidence. Legend feels his heart drop. “Our Vet wants t’a come back. Ain’t a doubt in my mind.”

And that was the question, wasn’t it?

Did he?

Chapter Text

portal to wild’s hyrule. go to purah because she Knows Things, she asks to be left alone with legend, wind and four (maybe twi?) while the others do other things

experiments, research, figuring out what went wrong and how to fix it! it’s a curse from aeons ago, predating even sky, traps the afflicted in the spirit realm until their soul slowly deteriorates into nothingness and they cease to exist. did not trap legend in the spirit realm because of his experience in different worlds, the fact it was a much weaker version of the spell & his array of protective jewellery (purah seems to be missing some stuff out, but they don’t question it), able to restore legend with a counter spell that purah should be able to find in a few days

aspects of life - various plants (stamina, health, strength)

aspects of memory - magic/spell circle

aspects of energy - legend’s contribution (highest risk)

++ when he had the first panic attack, he expelled a lot of life energy, which made him more spirit-like, hence why wind could sense him

++ when he had the second one, he expelled more energy, which made him even more spirit-like, hence why wind could sort of see him & why twilight could see him

++ magic from rods got intertwined with the magic from the curse and gave him hot-cold hands

++ in short, the curse got real fucked up

++ magic from the curse effects any similar magic (dark magic) as dark magic is the only magic that can undo it. as such, when the portal was formed (dark magic) it hurt the people affected by the curse (legend strongest, then wind and four) meaning that they got hurt. it stopped hurting because the application of magic had ended and it was just static now. doesn’t hurt when going through because the magic is still static

cut to the big fix, make it dramatic and long and really focus on how legend feels — he’s being torn apart and put back together again, torn out of somewhere that had grown familiar, feels his body becoming solid again and air forced back into his lungs, etc. end with a collapse

legend getting used to existing again, despite only being in that state for about two weeks. wind and four stay by his side the entire time. recovery, confessing about koholint, brotherly bonding. yelling at wars and sky

fin.