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coriander-recommends · 15 hours ago

Text

Blink

Summary: Wild has an episode. His brothers call it a seizure, but Wild disagrees.

Words: 2,414

Art for this fic / AO3

For @linked-disability , alternate prompt 1: Rare diseases/disorders (PNES).

PNES (psychogenic non-epileptic seizures, sometimes called functional or dissociative seizures) are seizures that resemble epileptic attacks but are caused by psychological distress instead of abnormal brain activity. They are a form of Functional Neurological Disorder.

They are not pseudo-seizures.

This fic is based on my own experience with PNES. The information that Wild says about his seizures is the same information that I was given when I was first diagnosed. Unfortunately, that information is blatantly incorrect. Please keep that in mind while reading. (What Four says is correct)

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Being the designated chef of the group came with some perks: while the others set up camp and argued over whose turn it was for various chores, Wild simply pulled out his cooking pot and started to work on dinner.

Of course, he wasn’t able to skip out on all the chores, but as he watched Wind grumpily follow Sky to find an area to dig their catholes, Wild was glad he was able to miss the more tedious ones.

He hesitated for a moment before pulling the last of his fortified pumpkins out of the slate. Pumpkin stew was always a hit with his brothers, and they hadn’t stayed in a village in days. They could use the boost.

Still, as Wild cut into the pumpkins, he couldn’t help but be upset that he was using the last of his pumpkins. Ever since he first picked up the slate, Wild had made sure to keep it stocked with food and elixir ingredients.

Now, though, his slate was emptier than it had been in years. He was running low on multiple of his essentials; he’d need to restock soon.

He pulled out the Tabantha wheat and began to separate the wheat berries from the stalks, mouth twisting in annoyance as he thought through his inventory.

There were a few things that he could get in the other eras. He had already stocked up on multiple bottles of Lon Lon Milk, courtesy of Malon, and Twilight had already promised him more goat butter the moment they landed in his era. Acorns, eggs. and herbs appeared in every Hyrule, even the traveler’s, and it was easy to hunt for more raw meat.

But the majority of his items were from his era, and even if he could replace them, he didn’t want to. Every time he made dinner for the group, he was sharing a bit of his home with them. If he got the ingredients from other eras, it wouldn’t be the same.

He dumped the pumpkin and wheat berries into the cooking pot. Now, he needed to add… milk? Butter, maybe? No, definitely milk. He had this recipe memorized, right? He had all his recipes memorized. It was milk.

Everything would be fine. They would visit his era soon, and he would refill his slate then. The farmers in Hateno always kept a few of their best crops for him; hopefully that hadn’t changed in the months since he saw them last.

Had it been months since he was last home? It must’ve been. It couldn’t be longer than that, Hylia wouldn’t be that cruel. He would be home soon. He would - he had to be-

Shit, he was burning the pumpkins. Where was his ladle?

He blinked,

and

His head hurt. There was a rock digging into his back. He went to sit up, and a pair of hands quickly rushed forward to steady him.

“Whoa, hold on,” Warriors looked down at him, concerned. “You back with us?”

“Back…?” Wild’s head felt fuzzy.

Wild squinted at the captain for a moment, trying to figure out what that meant. When that didn’t work, he leaned forward to peer over Warriors’ shoulder to look at the rest of the camp.

He was laying on a bedmat near the edge of their campground. Behind Warriors, he could see his brothers standing around the fire and his cooking pot, trying (and failing) to look like they weren’t staring at Wild.

“Can you tell me your name?” The captain asked, gently.

“Which one? Link or Wild?”

Warriors grinned, obviously relieved. “There you are. What’s the-”

Wild stopped listening the moment he saw Hyrule holding his ladle.

“Are you letting Hyrule cook?” Wild asked incredulously, trying to stand up. Pain shot through his head at the movement and he slumped back down into Warriors’ arms.

“Okay, none of that. You need to lay down for a while,” Warriors scolded him.

“But the soup,” Wild complained, “Rulie’s going to burn it, and I don’t have any more pumpkins -”

“He won’t burn it, the pot isn’t even on the fire,” Warriors tried to push him back down, but he resisted, looking at the campfire again.

Oh, his pot wasn’t on the fire, and his slate was on the ground next to it. Good.

Satisfied that his soup wasn’t burning, he flopped back down onto the bedmat. The pain had cleared some of the fuzz from his head, and he was slowly realizing how weird this situation was.

“Wild,” The captain stressed, and Wild realized he should probably be paying attention, “Have you hit your head at all recently? Even if it was just a small bump.”

“Uh, nope.” They were treating Wild like he was injured, but unless he had somehow gotten hurt while he was cooking dinner, he was fine.

Hm. Actually, now that he was thinking about it, this felt weirdly familiar. Underneath the slowly shrinking layer of fuzz in his brain, some kind of alarm was going off; he just wasn’t sure what.

“Do you feel sick? Dehydrated? You’ve been eating, right?” Warriors asked, pressing the back of his hand to Wild’s forehead.

“I’m not sick, I’m not dehydrated, and I was literally just making dinner for us.” Wild waved his hand away. “I feel fine. What’s with all the questions?”

Warriors sat back, clearly unhappy with Wild’s answers. “You had a seizure, Wild.”

Oh.

The last of the fuzz cleared from Wild’s head. The headache, the brain fog, the missing time that he only just realized was missing… he had an episode.

“Oh.” He repeated out loud.

“Oh??” Twilight repeated from where he was pacing next to the fire. “You had a seizure, we used a fairy, and you just -”

“Twilight,“ Time interrupted him. The rancher shut his mouth with an audible click.

Cold shame dripped down Wild’s spine. The others had clearly panicked if they wasted a fairy on him.

“Has this happened before, Wild?”

“Yeah.” Wild shrugged, "If it helps, they’re not really seizures.”

“That was definitely a seizure,” Warriors looked sick. “Do you have- do you know what epilepsy is?”

“I know what epilepsy is,” Wild snapped, a bit insulted. He took a deep breath before continuing, calmer this time, “I don’t have it. Zel- Flora and Purah scanned me. They said there wasn’t any sign of abnormal electrical activity or brain damage. They're not seizures, just something that happens sometimes.”

“This just happens sometimes,” Warriors repeated, voice flat, “And it’s not epilepsy.”

“Yup. That’s what I just said.”

Warriors pinched his nose with a deep sigh, and Wild instantly regretted snapping. He knew the captain wasn’t trying to insult him, but this wasn’t the first time he had been doubted like this and the sharp pain in his head was already testing his patience.

“Why didn’t you tell us about this?”

Wild looked away. Shame continued to wrap around his shoulders.

“…I found a book that talked about pseudoseizures. It said,” Wild hesitated, choosing his words carefully, “It said that talking about pseudoseizures can make them happen more often, so…”

“So you didn’t tell us.” Warriors finished. “That’s…”

“That doesn’t make sense.” Legend interrupted them. Warriors shot him a look, but Legend continued, “No, seriously. How would talking about seizures cause them more often?”

“They’re not real seizures.” Wild snapped. “They‘re pseudoseizures and they happen for attention. If you don’t talk about them, eventually I’ll learn that they don’t work and they’ll stop. You guys should’ve ignored me.”

“When did they start?” Four asked.

Wild clenched his fists in annoyance. He just said that they shouldn’t talk about them, and they were asking more questions.

He considered not answering, but the camp was silent, eight faces staring at him expectantly.

“I don’t know. Sometime during my journey.” He closed his eyes, resting his head against the ground. “I can’t really tell when they happen unless someone tells me, and I didn’t exactly spend a lot of time around people. Flora scanned me a few months after.”

“So they happen when no one’s around?”

Wild opened his eyes, turning towards Four. Their smith’s voice was strangely intense, and his normally gray eyes were rapidly swirling red, violet, green, and blue.

Wild shrugged, voice caught in his throat.

“Then how could they get attention?”

“…What?”

“If they happen when no one’s around, then how could you get attention from them?” Four continued to stare down Wild, eyes swirling faster and faster. “And if not talking about them makes them stop, then why have you dealt with them for so long?”

“I… I don’t…” Wild blinked rapidly, his annoyance quickly burning off into nothing but shame. He didn’t know the answer to those questions.

“In my time,” Four pressed on, “They haven’t been called pseudoseizures in years. They’re psychogenic nonepileptic seizures, and they’re caused by trauma, Wild, not talking.”

Four’s words didn’t make sense for a long moment. The book that Wild read was half destroyed, tucked away in one of the furthest shelves in the castle’s library. Flora wasn’t sure when it was written, let alone if it was even accurate, but it was the only information any of them had found about Wild’s condition.

So despite Flora’s concerns about the book, Wild had just… accepted it. He accepted that he was doing it for attention, even if they felt uncontrollable. He accepted that he needed to push away any thought of them. He accepted that he couldn’t ever talk about the shame he felt whenever he had another one.

“They are real seizures, okay? You’re not doing it for attention.” Four finished, voice going soft. “The next time we’re in my Castletown, I’ll take you to the library. There’s books on it there. I’ve read them.”

”…Thanks,” Wild whispered.

Four’s eyes settled into a pale magenta as he turned away, face turning light pink.

“And you still should’ve told us about it,” Warriors hesitantly broke the silence, “I understand why you didn’t, but if we knew about these in advance, we would’ve known what to do.”

Wild nodded, only half listening. He was still repeating Four’s words in his brain, barely believing them.

Warriors sighed again. He stood up and turned to the group behind him, glaring. “That goes for all of you as well. I better hear about any medical issues well before they become a problem, alright?”

Everyone avoided eye contact as they mumbled in vague agreement.

Warriors’ eye twitched as he turned back to Wild, pointing. “You need to stay here and rest. I see that look on your face, and no, you aren’t cooking either. I know you have enough leftovers in your Slate for one night. We’ll survive.”

Wild grumbled as Warriors walked away. He was fine, really, the only problem was his headache, and even that would be gone soon. He didn’t even have his slate to entertain himself.

He looked around the camp, debating on whether or not he could sneak away. The others were too high strung for him to slip away easily, especially without his stealth armor, but the treeline was pretty close…

He started shifting his weight to make a break for it.

As if he could hear his thoughts, Warriors spun around from where he was poking at the slate, glaring.

“Wild.” He threatened.

Wild threw his hands up, pretending to be innocent. “I’m not doing anything!”

Warriors raised one eyebrow.

“…I’m thirsty,” Wild tried instead. “You have all my stuff.”

“Here!” Wind rushed forward with a water skin. Hyrule was only a step behind him.

Knowing that Warriors was watching him, Wild took the water from Wind and drank some.

“Thanks, Wind.” He tried to not sound disappointed.

Wind and Hyrule both plopped themselves down in front of Wild, and he groaned internally. He might’ve been able to convince Hyrule to run off and explore with him, but Wind actually listened to Warriors.

He handed the water skin back to Wind, and accepted his boring fate.

“You called yourself Dink.”

”Uh, what?” Wild asked Wind.

“You called yourself Dink,” Wind repeated, “When Wars first asked. You said your name was Dink.”

“Huh. I don’t remember that.”

Wind shrugged. “You were pretty out of it.”

It was quiet again. Wild watched as Wars struggled with his slate, poking it and squinting.

”What does it feel like?” Hyrule suddenly asked.

“What does what feel like?”

“You know.” Hyrule waved his hand. “The seizures.”

Wild’s first instinct was to shut the conversation down, but… Well, if what Four said was true, then he didn’t need to stay quiet about it anymore.

Wind and Hyrule were looking at him, faces open and bright. There wasn’t any judgement, no sign that they thought he was strange or weak. They were just curious.

Wild took a moment longer to think about it. He had never explained it out loud, and it took him some time to gather the words he needed.

When he did start, it was slow and hesitant.

“It’s like blinking.” The words became more confident as he spoke. “One moment I’m doing something, I blink, and I’m on the floor. I don’t even realize that time has passed. If my head didn’t hurt, I wouldn’t even be able to tell they happened at all.”

He smiled slightly. “I don’t remember right before or after the seizures. Apparently, one time, I stood up and pointed at the sky before seizing. Purah thought I was possessed.”

Wind snorted. “Trust me, you’d know if you were possessed. Ghosts aren’t exactly subtle about it.”

“…You sound like you have experience?” Hyrule asked, both concerned and amused.

As Wind launched into an overdramatic retelling of his experiences with possession, Wild felt something in his chest loosen.

He had spoken about it, and nothing horrible happened. He hadn’t had another episode and his brothers weren’t looking at him any differently. In fact, Wild was pretty sure they were trying to cheer him up.

Hyrule burst into laughter as Wind accidentally smacked himself in the face with a particularly dramatic gesture, and Wild felt warm. He reached an arm out to pull their youngest hero closer to him, ruffling his hair along the way.

Wind sputtered but accepted the impromptu hug, even when Hyrule launched himself against them and shoved them into a pile on the ground, still laughing.

“Does it count as possession if I’m just hosting a part of their soul in me? Because I might be possessed.” “Wild, what?”

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