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When Wild had first met these heroes, the sharp scent of prey that clung to them was shocking in its intensity. The scent prickled the back of his throat, curled his lip, made him want to tearplayrend. Still, it was easy enough to ignore; he didn’t play with every molduga he came across, after all. It was odd though– he had never felt the frenetic energy to hunt other Hylians before, but it was easy enough to temper the urge and accept their invitation to join the so-called Heroes of the Forgotten Past.
(Never mind that joining was a formality. Wild knew there was no real choice in this excursion, and they all felt the pressure to different extents. Some of them bent under the weight, like the sailor and the traveller, withstanding the force of destiny better than the veteran or the old man who… cracked.)
Wild didn’t know what to expect when he agreed to travel with these Heroes, all of them incarnations of what was apparently his own soul. Wild had expected to feel some kind of... kinship, or a resonance. He wanted familiarity, wanted to finally belong to something that wasn't failure and the shackles of accountability. Wild had anticipated exerting the mental effort to keep them comfortable, but he didn’t think that befriending them would be hard. After all, if his Hyruleans could learn to live with him, so could these Heroes that were himself at the core, right?
Wrong.
It hurt, holding himself back all the time. Wild felt the building tension in his neck, his shoulders, his jaw– a dull throb that eroded his bones and left him exhausted. But as tiring as it was to mask his soul and repackage himself into something palatable, worse was the full-body ache that rolled through him every nightfall, like the last vestiges of his stamina giving out while training with Teba at the Flight Range.
Wild’s control was a tightly clenched fist around a rein he couldn't release. And when the others couldn’t get the space they needed to merely tolerate him, they trapped Wild with their proximity while his soul spasmed like a cramped muscle. Teeth gnashed until spots bloomed in his vision and the light burned and sound pierced, some instinct from Before telling him to find somewhere dark and quiet until the undulating pain behind his eye eased what a fairy elixir couldn't reach.
The only Hero that Wild felt safe enough to unwind around (not fully, never fully; there's an old fear there at the thought of letting go, an echo of Before. Something that wasn't his but is now) was the Hero of Twilight.
Wild liked Twilight. His soul, the part of Twilight that wasn’t also Wild, felt familiar to his own. His aura was steeped in muted orange and the security of shadows. Twilight was the grief of aching regret, a homesickness with nowhere to go, and oddly enough, something predatory that made Wild want to snap his teeth and play. The Hero of Twilight was honest with him and wasn’t put-off by Wild the way the others were.
Most significantly, Twilight seemed to like him the way that he was, not in spite of it. Twilight never implied that Wild was wrong in some way, and Wild didn’t realize how much those comments from the others —always said about him, never to him— hurt him until Twilight reached out with an unrelenting kindness that reminded Wild of the yearning tones of a bandoneon and the warmth of Saki’s roost.
Wild hadn't realized how lonely he had become until Twilight embedded himself at his side, despite the apprehension of his comrades.
It was familiar, that yawning loneliness that also must have come from Before, if his memories were to be trusted. The tolerance of what he was because of what he had to offer as a Hero but visceral rejection of who he was that ground him into nothing.
“No! Your version of her might have no choice but she doesn’t want you now.”
Sky’s words, despite his apology, struck somewhere within Wild that screamed truth truth truth. Because Sky was right and he didn’t even know how many times the Sword had rejected him until he was worthy of drawing her. Sky didn’t know how often the Deku Tree had intervened when Wild couldn’t see past the darkness occluding his sightline. He didn’t know how many times Wild had opened his eyes to Mipha tethering his soul back to his body. He didn’t know the too-bright pulse of the Sword’s heartbeat as she tested him and found him insufficient again and again, and still came to the correct conclusion.
Sky didn’t know how often Wild had screamed himself hoarse, desperate to know why he wasn’t enough.
And the Chosen Hero didn’t know any of that, and he never would if Wild had anything to do with it.
So, Wild kept his distance, kept his peace, and generally just tried to be… less of himself. It was a pattern of mental muscle memory that came easily to him.
Wild hadn’t realized just how long he had been away from home for until he inhaled his first clean breath in what felt like months.
Shutting his eyes for the briefest moment of reprieve, Wild took stock of his body. The ever-present vice locked around his chest eased minutely, lungs expanding with air so clean his toes tingled with it.
Ignoring the groans and rustling fabric of the other Heroes sorting themselves out, Wild wished desperately that he knew how to unbind his aura a little bit, just enough to stretch out the phantom pain that came from ironclad containment. But the others were too close for him to try, and Wild didn’t want to deal with that right now. Not when a familiar tug in his chest told him Zelda was far west– probably in Tabantha based on the cool breeze twining with the divinity that reminded him of Sun and the Otherness reminiscent Deity and himself.
For the first time in months, the ever-present tension in his shoulders eased. Wild was home.
“You good, Cub?”
Shaking off his thoughts, Wild turned a genuine smile in Twilight’s direction, eyes crinkling when he didn’t flinch. “This is my Hyrule!”
Wild bounced on the balls of his feet, taking in the familiar surroundings of the Akkala Highlands before pulling out his Slate to pinpoint their location, pre-emptively accommodating for Time’s persistent dismissal of Wild’s words.
He didn’t need a map or even his eyes to tell him that they were slightly north of Tarrey Town. Inhaling deep to settle in his skin, Wild reached for the Claim on his cheek. It was just an echo, but if he stretched just a little bit more—
Ah. She’s the unrelenting heat of flying too close to the sun, the bone-deep vibration of something deep deep deep beneath the sand. And beneath all that, the unmitigated joy of childhood.
“Tarrey Town.” Wild breathed, delight rising in his chest. His hands flapped as he bounced, releasing some of the unrelenting joy coursing through him.
“Welcome to Tarrey Town!”
At the end of the isthmus near Tarrey Town's entrance, Wild barred the other Heroes from entry with an air of protective menace that had Time skittering back and Twilight arching a brow in confusion.
Wild didn’t know how to word this. It was already hard enough, and he only had one safe person in this large group. Wild played nice; he didn’t push back on directions, even when they chafed, and generally tried to make himself as small as possible in the wake of the Heroes’ discomfort.
But it wasn’t just about him, now.
“What is it, Wild?” Time asked when Wild clearly took too long to explain himself.
Wild took in the group behind him: Sky, Hyrule and Four tucked furthest away, whispering amongst themselves while Warriors and Wind braced for some unseen threat in front of them that belied the wonder on their faces. Too far away to hear, Wild assumed. Good, better to keep this information contained.
He looked at Time, the clench of his jaw and the deliberate unclenching of two-three-four fingers on his left hand while Legend stood off to Time’s right, weight rested on one hip with an impatient tap of his foot. Twilight stood the closest to him, head tipped in that way that reminded Wild of the wasteland coyotes.
Against his back, the Gerudo sun continued to burn.
“Wild?”
“Link?” A small voice called in delight. Wild’s eyes shut against the terror building in his chest.
“You have to be nice to her.” Wild said in a rush, back straightening as anger overtook the fear. “She’s like me. And you can say whatever you want about me, but she’s just a kid and there’s nothing wrong with her. I won’t allow her to believe otherwise.”
Wild opened his eyes and was immediately shocked by the abject despair growing over Time’s face, but anything he might have said was interrupted by Twilight’s hand resting on the back of his neck and–
“Papa! Papa! Link is here!”
“Just…" Wild glanced over his shoulder, "Be kind to her, even when she makes you uncomfortable. Lie. You get to leave, but this is our home.”
“Link!” Wild shook off their stunned expressions and fully turned around just in time for the four-year old girl to collide with his legs, staring up at him with a grin baring knife-point teeth in the sweetest smile in all of Hyrule, Wild was certain.
“Mattison!” Wild shouted playfully through a helpless laugh. The air was coloured with a different kind of shock from the others as he scooped Mattison into his arms and held her tight to his chest, something in his soul rolling over in contentment. Rocking back her back and forth, Wild felt his aura reach for hers without his permission as her little hand refreshed the Claim she laid on his cheek as an infant.
Behind him, the pressure of Twilight's woodsy aura and the whisper of dusk-lit shadows approached. "Hello, li'l lady."
Mattison hid her face in Wild's shoulder, shy in the face of a stranger. Still, her aura reached out with childish curiosity, poking at Twilight and infusing desert heat among the shadows.
Twilight's hand was a warm weight on his shoulder and Wild could feel his friendly joy reaching back toward her. Wild should really make introductions.
He didn’t care though, not when the edges of unforgiving desert heat filled in the cracks left open for her to explore, finally warming the chill of isolation. Wild was home.
“Fyson said we’d find you here.”
Of all the heroes that bore witness to Wild’s… lapse in emotional control, earlier, he expected Time to come find him after Kapson and Hudson got everyone settled in the inn. Wild would just stay in Rhondson and Hudson’s spare room, as he usually did. Something about Rhondson’s mortal offence the first few times Link offered to stay at the inn as he passed through Tarrey Town.
“You are gerasi.” Rhondson had exclaimed with a hand on her hip while Hudson had nodded along with baby Mattison drooling away on his shoulder. Link's good ear flattened. He didn't want to intrude.
Rhondson wasn't having any of it. "Come inside," she ordered. When he peeked up from the floor, Hudson had a hand extended toward him in earnest invitation.
Family. Wild reclined more firmly along the roof of Rhondson and Hudson’s home. He wondered if he could ever have that with these Heroes. Did he even want that with them, anymore?
A short eternity later, Time sighed.
“We haven’t been very kind to you.”
Wild’s chest locked up, deeply unsettled by the compassion in Time’s voice considering that Time barely tolerated him. Wild did not want to deal with this.
“You can’t help it.” Wild brushed him off, even though a small, angry part of him didn’t agree.
Gritting his teeth, he soldiered on, “I’m just... like this."
And he always has been. The memories from Before belonged to the sword, but even through the strange looking-glass of the past, Wild knew it to be true.
He suspected he had more control, Before. As if death burned it out of him along with his memories and strength.
“Wild.” Time sighed, breaking his reverie. He heard a thunk, maybe of Time resting his head against the wall.
"You can’t help the way you are. Us struggling with your… aura, in this way, isn’t an excuse for being cruel. And we have been. Cruel. To you.”
Wild scoffed. The old man sounded like he was making a confession, like the admittance was taking something vital from him. He told the Deity this already, that Wild didn't want to- upset the others. Scare them, unsettle them- and it rarely made a difference. It didn't matter what Wild did to make them comfortable. Not when they all continued looking at him like that.
There wasn't anything wrong with the way he was! Not until this- this journey. It wasn't fair!
"Wild?"
He shook his head in disgust. Wild couldn’t hear this right now. He didn’t have the control to engage in this type of vulnerability with anyone that wasn’t His.
“Look, I get it-” he started to dismiss. This conversation was over-
“Cub.”
Wild’s breath caught. That wasn't Time's to use.
“We’re trying." A dull roar filled his ears. "I’m sorry.”
Wild squeezed his hands over his ears and shook his head again.
He wished the Deity came instead.