#tbp skyloft

[batrogers]

4 with chief and whoever was idiot enough to hide an injury- before they knew he would explode at them :0

Well it's a Chief version of exploding, which is to say Disappointment (TM) TBP Skyloft & Chief, rated G ~750 words. Non-graphic injury.

Also on AO3

IIII

It was the greatest fucking insult his legs gave out on him mid-dodge. Link collapsed to the ground and felt the blinding impact hit the back of his skull moments later. He lay still, stunned, but something got the lizalfos to dart away seconds later.

When he sat up, dazed and shaken, he saw the arrow not far away. He hissed and pulled it from the dirt and set it to his bow again himself to carry on helping the others from what should’ve been a fucking safe distance.

The fight was over not long after that. Link shook himself and paused, head spinning with regret as the pain returned. He carefully put his bow away and reached up to feel along the back of his skull – but, thank every wind he could name, he wasn’t bleeding.

“You okay?” Four asked. He was visibly walking off a sprain, blood spatter across his green tunic, and Link smiled and gave a shallow nod.

“Fine, thanks. I just got a bit of a scare.”

“Alright.”

Link liked that about Four: he didn’t fuss, not much. Not often. He thought to go check on the others himself, as he had the most medical training after Chief, but there was an odd pressure in his head that left his eye sore. He pressed one hand to his temple again and went to find somewhere to sit down as the others took care of themselves.

That was a nice thing about their group: everyone was good with injuries on at least a basic level. Chief mostly helped with cleaning wounds, stitches, and broken bones. The rest healed quickly between them all. A knock to the head was nothing.

So why did it seem to just be getting worse?

He put his face in his hands for several seconds, or what only felt like it, and then startled as someone spoke to him.

“Skyloft, what’s wrong?”

He jerked up, his head banging like a drum, and turned to see Chief was looking at him with worry in his eyes.

“I’m fine,” he said, and closed his eyes against the stabbing pain. “It’s nothing. Is everyone else seen?”

“Open your eyes again, I need to check something. Your left eye looked wrong—“

“It’s fine, I just got a hit to the head. It’ll pass in a minute.”

“It’s been fifteen minutes,” someone said. It wasn’t Chief, but someone else’s voice he couldn’t place past the blinding pain. “Shouldn’t that have healed already?”

Chief didn’t answer aloud. Link felt his hands touch his hair and start towards the lump he’d felt earlier, although it stung with pain long before he got very close. Link twisted his head away and pushed himself to standing, one hand on Chief’s shoulder. He opened his eyes, trying to orient himself.

His vision swam, like waves of dark water, and the shadows clawed their way in from the edges until everything went black.

When Link woke up again, he was laying on his back on a pallet in a tent, with the taste of fairy dust on his lips. He made a face and pressed one hand to his head, but there was no sign of any injury at all.

“You’re awake?” Chief said. “How much do you remember?”

“...We were fighting a lizalfos camp... I think.” There were scraps of memory after, but the sense of what happened slipped through his fingers like water.

“I figured,” the other man knelt and bent over him, a lamp in hand. He moved it across his vision, back and forth, and Link had a sinking feeling he knew what had happened.

“I hit my head?”

“Judging by the injury and a few others who saw you go down, something hit it for you. You didn’t bleed so I didn’t catch it as quickly as I should’ve or we might not have needed the fairy. You had blood in your eye and the pupil was blown by the time we realized you were hurt.” He sank back on his heels with a scowl.

Link sat up tentatively and rubbed one hand over his neck. He cleared his throat. “I’m sorry. I know better.”

“Given the severity of your concussion, I forgive you the lapse in judgment,” Chief smiled crookedly as he spoke. “I doubt you were thinking straight. But maybe next time something actually hits you, tell me right away given we both know you can’t judge for yourself.”

Link groaned and pressed both hands to his face. Using up a fairy in their group was a bad sign; they didn’t heal like Hylians. “Promise,” he said. “Next time.”

[triforce-of-mischief]

[@batrogers requested 5; Hugging them tightly, telling them how worried you were]

****

Hateno had thought that the Lightning Temple had been a pain to navigate, with random piles of sand hiding all the important things and gibdos sleeping in the shadows, but he almost missed the place now. Skyloft had introduced this dungeon as the Lanayru Mining Facility, but hadn’t been able to explain much else as he was busy clearing a path through knee-deep sand dunes. Minish, seeing Skyloft use his gust bellows, had brought out their own and was attempting to help without shooting sand in everyone’s faces. Hateno stood back with the rest, looking warily at their surroundings.

The Lightning Temple, at least, hadn’t been crawling with oversized robots.

They stood taller than even Prince, three round segments supporting a head with a single eye. They were inactive now, but Hateno didn’t doubt that they, like his guardians, would shoot lasers at trespassers. The central room they stood in was large, deadly silent, and Hateno couldn’t turn around without seeing another robot stationed on a walkway or in front of a door. He didn’t like it, but only Far seemed to agree.

Hateno looked around again, confirming that the young man was still hiding at the back of their group. Ordon was with him, while Rabbit watched Smith help in her own way by using a magic rod to form concentrated pillars of sand. The rest of the group were split between waiting or exploring, and Hateno spotted Chief among the latter. Having seen his reaction to the guardians, Hateno wasn’t surprised that his boyfriend had gone straight to the mysterious machines. He tried not to worry, telling himself that the robots were clearly unable to move. Some of the guardians had deceptively appeared to be the same, but Hateno trusted Skyloft’s complete lack of concern as his companions walked right up to them.

Skyloft turned off his gust bellows, giving himself a minute to breathe. Minish stopped as well, letting Skyloft lean on them for support. Skyloft stared at the nearest robot for a moment, then looked up to the golden cage suspended from the ceiling.

“Don’t touch any crystals,” Skyloft said, his hand absently going to the beetle bracer on his wrist. “They activate the beamos- they’ll try to kill you, and it’s hard to destroy them without getting hit.”

Hateno’s breath caught, and he frantically searched again for Chief. His boyfriend was investigating a robot- beamos- in the near corner of the room. Behind him, a glimmer of purple poked out of a pile of sand. Chief hadn’t noticed it yet, but if his attention slipped away from the beamos-

“Chief!” Hateno called, then muttered under his breath when his boyfriend was too entranced by the robot to hear. He walked as close to the beamos as he dared, then tried again. “Chief, come back, that’s dangerous.”

Chief gave him an annoyed look. “It’s corroded by centuries of inactivity and sand. The power source doesn’t even lead to anything anymore-”

“Love,” Hateno said, letting him hear the fear in his voice. “Don't mess with it, please.”

Chief sighed, then picked his way across the sand and back to Hateno. He glanced longingly at the beamos, but Hateno grabbed his arms and pulled him into a hug. He held him tight, the reminder that his boyfriend was safe, that the fatal flashes of light were all in his head.

“Hateno, I’m fine, there’s no chance of them reactivating,” Chief grumbled, though he was leaning into him.

“I’m just worried about you. I don’t want to see you hurt,” Hateno said quietly. “Sky says they can, and he knows this place better than we do. Let’s let him lead for now.”

[batrogers]

Prompt writing, "Touch Starved"

That Broken Promise, Outset POV. Rated G. 700 words.

Also on AO3

IIII

Travel with the others was exhausting for Link, when he had to spend so much of his effort just trying to walk without tripping on something. At least he had a staff – at least he’d been able to get a staff in Prince’s world. But that didn’t turn a long day of walking on unfamiliar ground into something easy.

He missed his ship. He missed Tetra, and the others, and a boat he knew without having to check where he was walking as often, or as much, or even fucking care if he tripped and faceplanted on deck. It didn’t matter all that much if he took a minor injury or two at home; others could fill in.

But here? Here, it mattered if he was sick or injured or hurt. It slowed the others down, and not all of them were that patient. Worse: he wasn’t even the most compromised of them. Skyloft or Four was easily worse, and some days Hateno too...

He wasn’t used to that. It felt stupid, to lay on the sleeping pad on solid ground in a tent, brilliantly lit by a flower rooted through the bottom layer of fabric, and miss being the most compromised person in the area...

But he kind of did. He pressed one hand to his face and groaned.

“Are you feeling alright?” Skyloft asked.

“Fine,” Link muttered. He’d forgotten, or just not noticed when Skyloft joined him, which he should’ve expected. He tired so easily some days. “I’m sorry, I’m just...”

“Homesick?”

He thought about lying, then remembered he wasn’t the only person who’d cried themself to sleep of late. He twisted til he could see the shape of his companion in the corner of his eye. “Yeah, I am.”

“Just for company or...?”

He thought Skyloft was looking at him. Link pushed himself up on one elbow and raised an eyebrow. “What kind of company?”

“I mean, you said you live on a ship. I imagine you’re used to being close to others a lot.” It seemed to take Skyloft a second to remember to clarify, “I don’t mean sex.”

Link snorted loudly. “What, are you just cold?”

He wasn’t sure if that was a symptom Skyloft had a lot, but he could admit he did miss the way everyone at home, on Tetra’s ship touched him. Too many of their companions startled so easily it was too much of a risk to reach out but...

Skyloft wasn’t one of them.

“Yeah,” Skyloft said. “Kinda. C’mere?”

He might be lying, but if it made it easier on them both to agree, Link would take it. He pushed his staff further into the corner of the tent and dragged his blanket with him to curl up at Skyloft’s side. The other man did seem a little cold. There was a brief period of fumbling, blankets and tangled legs, but Link got himself against Skyloft’s legs and his head on his pillow, and both their blankets overtop of them. Skyloft sighed gently and laid an elbow on Link’s shoulder.

“Is that okay? I was reading.”

“Book or journal?” Link asked. His face was pressed against Skyloft’s side, his tunic smelling like person but also some kind of scented soap he couldn’t place. He must’ve gotten something at one of their stops. Link had no idea who did their laundry most days – it cycled around people, but never to him. Blindness got him out of a lot of chores, it seemed.

“Technically both,” Skyloft said. “I... We got books when we were in Lorule, I don’t think anyone mentioned them to you given...”

“I can’t write very well, no,” Link agreed. “I didn’t know you write.”

“It’s about the surface – the world I saw on my journey.” His voice was soft, and fond. “I could read it to you? You can tell me how it sounds.”

Link settled further against his side with the relief of knowing exactly where he was, and where someone else was and hummed his agreement, and Skyloft trailed a hand down his arm. He heard pages flip, and he began to read.

[batrogers]

skyloft for blorbo bingo?

Assuming you mean my poor boy....

I love tormenting him, but he is a true cinnamon roll, ngl.

[triforce-of-mischief]

assigning metallica songs to @thatbrokenpromise because i CAN (and because @batrogers asked me to)

skyloft: ride the lightning

minish: the thing that should not be

kokiri: don't tread on me

ordon: the struggle within

four: holier than thou

outset: master of puppets

chief: too late too late

rabbit: escape

smith: leper messiah

far: fade to black

prince: the unforgiven

hateno: the god that failed

[batrogers]

@next-hero-in-line, the results of your inspiringly heroic achievement of not getting blood on the carpet after your last nose bleed.

Man I don't draw my Skyloft enough. Photo reference was one from Squid after said incident.