Chapter Text
Warriors wakes up tired.
That's what happens when you stay up all night looking at a fucking lake, Warriors. Idiot.
He sighs and drags a hand down his face. Today he has to talk to Sky. He has to talk about the why and the how long and his disgusting emptiness. He dresses, repacks anything he took out yesterday (mostly just his bedroll), and looks jealously at those of his brothers that are still sleeping, knowing quite well that he will not be able to fall back asleep. Damn.
Warriors' ears are tense throughout most of the day and he's twitchy. He knows Time catalogued each jump of his eyes to the stable doors during their morning coffee. Wind stuck to him like a barnacle, ate lunch pressed against his side like he could squish the anxiousness writhing in Warriors' chest out by brute force. Even Legend shot him a concerned eyebrow raise.
He's not avoiding Sky, despite the terror that floods his chest whenever the man comes near. But no conversation has happened yet. And if Sky doesn't want to press, he won't either.
In the late afternoon, they clear a camp of bokoblins. One has a small sword, catches Warriors up the thigh. The left one. Specifically.
Damn.
It's not bad, not really—definitely not deep enough or in the right place to cause any muscle damage or immediately worrying, 'get-off-the-field-so-you-don't-die' blood loss, but it's still not great. That's his official diagnosis: not great.
Hell if he's showing Hyrule. Kid doesn't need to see his ground meat thigh. Fuck no. How's he gonna get out of it, though?
He slashes upwards, catching the bokoblin in the soft pallet of its jaw.
He could just...slip away. The fight's winding down—only one blue-pelted bokoblin is left and it's not black-blooded. But it's extremely obvious and out-of-character; Hylia knows how many times he's scolded the others for splitting off. Plus a certain healer would kill him for hiding an injury.
Last resort, then. What else? He kicks a small rock as he heads to group up at the edge of the clearing. Hyrule's already flitting around, healing. He could talk to him, privately tell him that Warriors will take care of it himself and promise to wash it out before taking a potion. But again, suspicious. And he'll definitely tell Legend, who will for sure investigate (nosy-ass). And Hylia knows what he'll think if he catches what Warriors is actually hiding.
Warriors still a good ways away from the main group when Sky spots him. He immediately turns to Hyrule, speaking and gesturing at Warriors. Uh-oh. Hyrule stands up from where he was crouched next to Four's sprained ankle. He tilts his head and puts his hands on his hips. Sky points down at Four, then back at Warriors. Hey. Hey, what the fuck is happening. Hyrule sighs and nods. Sky smiles at him, sunny, and catches his bicep. He says something encouraging, judging by the way Hyrule's posture opens, then jogs over to Warriors. His smile drops on the way over and he chews on his lip as he slows. Warriors feels his chest tighten, nervous.
"What was that?"
"I got Hyrule to let me treat you instead since he needs to work on Four's ankle so we can travel. Hurry, hurry. I don't want you bleeding much more."
"Sky, it's on my left leg. I can't-I-you're the only one who—"
"I know, I know. And he would want to check it if you were just treating it yourself—that's why I convinced him to let me handle it."
Sky leads him to edge of the group, leaning him against a tree with his left facing away from the group. They're at a 45° from the others, so Warriors can easily keep an eye out for anyone straying too close.
Warriors shimmies down the left side of his pants while Sky cleans his hands off to the side. He comes back and presses down on the wound with a bandage in hand.
"Why are you helping me, yknow..." Warriors starts.
"Hide it?"
"Yeah. That."
Sky hums, lifting the bandage to check if the bleeding's slowed. He presses it right back, so probably not.
"Would it help you? If Hyrule knew? If he learned this way, when it's not your choice?"
Warriors shakes his head. There's a sticky, trapped feeling caging his sternum just thinking about it.
"Doubtful."
Sky nods like that's all the reason he needs, like Warriors' feelings are enough justification to implicate himself in this fucked up habit of his. Then he checks again and deems the bleeding to have slowed enough.
"Water time."
They're quiet as Sky rinses out the wound, Warriors for the sting and Sky as he counts in his head. Sky washes a bit around it, then wraps it. In his relief at not being exposed, Warriors can't seem to find room for guilt over using up resources. And it's... it's almost nice, to be looked after like this. Sky is gentle, using only enough pressure to be effective, wrapping the bandage carefully and deliberately. He pats Warriors' leg when he's done and stands. He starts to walk away and Warriors has a strange instinct to call out for Sky, but he was just washing his hands. He offers a hand to Warriors and pulls him up. On the road again, it seems. They trail privately behind the group. Time glances at them, but ultimately lets it fly.
"Think it's time for that 'tomorrow conversation'?"
Warriors sighs.
"Probably." He waits a beat, in case Sky has something he wants to start with. Sky's picking at the skin on his thumb and biting the inside of his lip, but Warriors is willing to bet it's self-soothing for the general conversation, not in preparation to speak. "Are you going to do it, do you think?"
Sky's picking winds down, and he stares off for a second. "I don't... No, I don't think so. Maybe. Probably not. Maybe."
That's... not reassuring in the slightest, actually. Sky is normally passionate and, not confident, exactly, but there's a sureness about him, a rightness. He fits within himself, within the world. Right now, he's translucent and wrong-footed—hold him up to sunlight and you'd see it stream through.
Drifting he may be, but it doesn't stop Sky from laughing at him.
"Sorry, sorry. Your expression was so," he interrupts himself with a giggle, "you looked exactly like you did the first time Hyrule cooked."
Warriors cannot imagine that that is possibly true. He says as much. Sky giggles again, then sobers, just a bit.
"I mean... I get it. It's not every day someone up and says that kind of thing. But I want to try to be honest. What's the point of this if we're not? Whatever exists, whatever we're doing, it's not like not saying it makes it not happen. Does that—do you get what I'm saying?"
Warriors hums.
"Kind of. I think so. We've already shown that we're not going to tell the others, at least not right now. We could pretend to solve it or that it never happened, but I can't imagine that'd take us very far. The only way I see this turning out favorably is honesty, like what you said."
Sky nods.
"What about you? Is what you have now," he gestures to Warriors' leg, "is that as bad as it's going to get?"
"Thats," Warriors sighs, "a hard question. What I do right now, the extent of it... is probably as much as I can manage without risking too much. If I—if it went any farther, there could be complications. Consequences, long-term and for functionality." He laughs, bitter. "I've long given up on the cosmetic side."
He can see Sky's expression twist, in the corner of his eye, but ignores it.
"That's not an answer," Sky points out.
"Maybe."
They both sigh—two maybes, what do you do with that?
"Will you tell me?" Sky's eyes are pleading. "If you do end up going farther. Just... come to me. Don't go it alone."
And that's just the thing about this. They're miserable, both of them; Warriors is drowning in guilt, in grief and worry, and he doesn't know what's doing this to Sky, but it's certainly brutal. But now they're doing it together. It's a comfort, morbid as it is. He won't lie, not to Sky. Not when Sky seems to get it.
"Yes," he wasn't expecting to agree so easily, but here he is, "conditionally."
Sky tilts his head, smiling softly.
"I have a guess as to what that condition might be."
"You have to do the same. If it's a bad day, if you might actually..." he swallows, hard. "Even if you have to wake me up in the middle of the night. You have to tell me."
Sky nods.
"I will. I promise you."
Goddess, Warriors hopes he keeps that promise. He hopes they both do.