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As a long-time superstar of the Central Hyrule Knights, Link Wild had been in this situation before.
The season was nearing its end. Surprisingly, the Knights had a rather mediocre season and were barely clinging onto the wild card spot in the standings. It was a tight race to make the playoffs and the Knights were desperate to make it in, even if they had to claw their way in. Right now they were playing the Lanayru Region Zora, who were just trailing behind the Knights in the playoff race. The Knights were currently down 5-2 but their bases were loaded. They had two outs. It was the bottom of the eighth. The Zora had been surprisingly aggressive and effective on offense. They had taken advantage of the Knights’ pitching having a shaky start. While Link and the Knights weren’t having a bad game offensively, they weren’t making it to the plate enough. Link began walking to the on-deck circle from the dugout. He was ready to clear the bases for his team.
Of course, that wasn’t his only motivator for getting a home run. He looked behind him over his shoulder. From the on-deck circle, he glanced at Zelda. The love of his life as well as the best anthropologist he has ever met. She was also the only anthropologist he had ever met. Zelda noticed her boyfriend eyeing her. With a wide smile on her face, she waved at him and used her fingers to draw a heart in the air. Link couldn’t help but chuckle before he blew her a kiss.
Zelda used her hands to form a cone around her mouth and shouted, “Kick their asses, Linky!”
Link scoffed and rolled his eyes hearing the nickname. Letting the bat rest in between his legs, he used his own hands as a cone and responded.
“My thoughts exactly, Zellie!” He shouted back in return, flashing a toothy and confident grin.
Picking up his bat again, he turned around to see how Hoz, his teammate, was doing at the batter’s box. Turning just in time to see Hoz swing and miss for a strike. Then, a called strike by the umpire. Hoz seemed peeved that it was called a strike, though not without cause. It looked to be slightly out. And Kilton pitched a slider, which initially looked like it was heading slightly out of the strike zone. However, it curved in and it was a strike. This was strange to Link, Hoz was usually the person they could count on to get a base hit. Hoz was a contact-centric hitter and it was unusual to see him get struck out on three pitches.
Link began walking to the batter’s box and Hoz passed by him. They stopped to chat quickly. “Don’t worry, Hozzy, you'll get 'em next ti- woah! You look like you’ve seen a ghost!”
Hoz shivered. “Why did they have to bring in Kilton to pitch?! They know he gives me the creeps! I swear to the goddesses…”
Patting his shoulder, Link simply told Hoz, “I’ve got this. I’ll make sure to embarrass him so hard that the coaches will have to pull him out after one pitch.”
“You better.”
Hoz slowly made his way back to the dugout while Link stepped up to the plate. He took a couple warm up swings and waited for the pitcher to finish his pre-pitch routine. Once they were ready to start, Link got into his batting stance and stared the pitcher down.
Kilton simply giggled creepily before winding up and throwing the baseball. The ball zipped through the air and Link swung for the fences. But all he was greeted with was the sound of the ball hitting the glove.
Mouthing a swear, he swung his arms around a bit and thought about the next pitch. He looked back at the dugout and saw all of his teammates standing at the edge with their arms rested on the fence. Bludo was sitting on the bench, wearing seven eyepatches with a fake mustache. He was actually supposed to be ejected but somehow he would always evade security and return with one new eyepatch. Eventually, the umpires gave up on throwing him out of the game. Was is orthodox to let Bludo stay? No. But it was tiring trying to get him to leave.
Link turned to face the pitcher and got ready for the second pitch. When they were both ready, Kilton wound up his arm and threw the ball. This time, Kilton threw a curveball. Link was about to swing at it but when he noticed it veering downwards, he stopped his swing and let the ball pass for a checked swing. Strike one, ball one. Things were going okay.
He looked up at the outfield crowd and noticed them going wild for some reason. They were probably shouting to the outfielders and saying some weird chirps that he probably couldn’t even imagine. Poor outfielders.
Link then focused on the pitcher. Would he go for another breaking ball? Kilton was a two pitch pitcher, which made things easier for Link as he had less pitches to worry about dealing with. On the flip side, it also meant Kilton was way more efficient with both since he had fewer types of pitches to practice and more time to practice his two pitches.
Taking a deep breath, Link got into his batting stance. Kilton was also in his ready stance. Winding up his arm, the pitcher launched a bullet of a fastball at Link. Link dug his heels in the ground and swung at the ball as hard as he could.
Perfection.
Link hit the ball and it went flying over the field. Kilton still had his ever-present creepy smile but he seemed to be sweating nervously. It flew over the infielders. The ball continued to soar in the sky. In desperation, the left fielder ran back. However, the ball was going faster than he was. It was just about to go over the wall.
“BAWK!”
The ball did end up going over the wall. However, it had obviously hit something.
What was that? Confused, Link looked back as he ran around the bases. He slowed down to a walk around third base. Then he saw it. Despite all the odds and despite how improbable it was, a cucco had been hit by Link’s homer. And it looked mad. Real mad. Not only had it been kidnapped by some random dude but it was brought to a random ballpark. Then it was thrown off the top deck. To top it all off, now it had just been hit by a baseball as it was floating down. It landed on the field wall. The Cucco took a deep breath before let out a deafening squawk, extending it's wings in a glorious T-Pose.
Link Wild was concerned and looked back periodically at the Cucco as he jogged from third base to home plate. Then he took a quick glance of the dugout. Normally, his teammates would be celebrating but some had confused expressions while others looked like they feared for their life. He was questioning why they had those reactions. After all, it was just one cucco. It wouldn’t do anything to cause trouble, right?
In his head, it was as if he could hear all of his ancestors facepalm. It was followed by the sound of non-stop clucking from what looked like hundreds of cuccos.
“Cucco swarm!” one of the veteran players yelled.
Everyone in the crowd was either running to find a place to hide, laughing, or ducking down. Zelda ran down the stairs and shouted at Link to run away. The outfielders of the Zora tried running back to the dugout but could not reach it before the cuccos swarmed the field so they simply dropped to the ground and laid down on the turf.
One of the Zora outfielders, veteran Muzu, even began praying to Nayru. “Hi, Nayru. My name is Muzu and that idiot Link just unleashed cucco hell on us. For the love of Hylia, please don’t let one of those disgusting birds eat me as if I was an oversized fish!”
Pitchers in their respective bullpens also laid down on the ground. Infielders rushed to the dugout. However, they weren’t the one the cuccos were aiming for. Link was.
“Get your ass over here, Wild!” Bludo shouted before grabbing a bat and brandishing it. “I’ll hold them off!”
“Are you crazy old man?! Do you remember what happened the last time a team tried fighting the cuccos?! They had to pull out of the season due to all the injuries!” Dento, the team’s equipment manager, exclaimed.
Link Wild saw the cuccos rushing at him. He finally realized the gravity of the situation when he noticed how sharp their beaks were. Running as fast as he could, he made a beeline towards the dugout. All the players in the dugout were trying to make it to the clubhouse as fast as they could so they could find a room and hide in it.
He ran over home plate, almost as if to make the home run official, and almost made it to the dugout. However, the cuccos were just behind him. Link was too slow to outrun them and he ended up being engulfed by a storm of cuccos. Multiple pecked his face, some even ripped his clothes, and others were aiming for the family jewels. He swore that he saw some of them smiling at him as they attacked him. Link panicked. Not because of the pain but because he would end up dying to a swarm of cuccos. He, a superstar and an athletic icon, would die to a bunch of big fluffy birds.
Bludo, being the crazy old Goron he was, swung his club to clear the birds and began bashing as many as he could. He was not able to kill any of them but he was able to get most of them off Link. He had moved his seven eyepatches down, and now it just looked like he had an eyepatch beard.
“I swear to Din, if we could find out a way to control these bootlegged, small Ritos, we’d have the most indestructible military in the world!” Bludo spouted out as he continued to fight as many cuccos as he could.
Bludo turned to look at Link. He shouted, “WHAT ARE YOU LAYING THERE FOR?! RUN, YOU GODDESS DAMNED IDIOT! ARE YOU TIRED OR SOMETHING? GET YOUR ASS IN THAT CLUBHOUSE OR I’LL CUT IT OFF BEFORE THESE FEATHERY JACKASSES DO, YOU HEAR ME?!”
As Link began to run off, he heard a loud crack followed by Bludo shouting, “You made me crack my back again?! Now you’re going to pay!”
Link was too focused on getting to a safe place to laugh at Bludo’s antics. For once, he was actually thankful that Bludo was outright crazy. It had saved his life. And somehow, it helped Bludo hold back the storm of cuccos that were out for his blood. He went into the clubhouse and closed the locker room doors. All the other players were panting and sighing in relief.
“You just HAD to be a show-off and hit the cucco, didn’t you, Wild?” a teammate joked.
Link chuckled. “Well, Zel is watching so I had to show off somehow. Plus, I didn’t know they’d bring a whole ass cucco! How did they even get it past the guards?! Also, who in their right mind takes a cucco to a baseball game?!”
Then he remembered. Zel. Was she alright? He was pretty sure he saw her go down the stairs to check on him. Link hoped that the cuccos didn’t go after her. They had done quite a number on him. He had a couple cuts from their talons and beaks and was bleeding quite a bit. Feathers were littered all over his body. The man walked into the medical room. Thankfully, one of the trainers was there and helped him get bandaged. Bandaged up and sitting up on his bed, he saw someone poke their head around the door. Her blonde hair immediately revealed who she was.
“I could have taken them on, for the record.” Link said defensively. “I just didn’t want to hurt them.”
“Really? You expect me to believe that when you look like this? You look more beat than that baseball that you gave me your number with. I still have to slap you for that cocky move, by the way.” Zelda replied with a snort.
“Hey, I was caught off guard! It’s not my fault that they somehow can materialize out of nowhere!”
Zelda laughed and walked up to Link’s bed in the medical room. She sat down beside him and tried getting a few feathers off of him. “Look at you. You’re covered in so many cucco feathers that I’m half sure you’re just an oversized cucco. I mean, you sure are as noisy and jumpy as one.”
Link pouted. “Hey, I’m not that bad!” He couldn’t hold the pout long and eventually chuckled.
“I never said that was a bad thing.” Zelda replied before giving him a quick peck on the lips. “I like your energetic side.”
“Then, why don’t we use my energy to have some fun?” Link suggested with a smirk. He glanced over at the janitor’s closet.
“Really? Right now? Right there? Are you sure nobody will find us there? You’re in the middle of a game!” Zelda asked, surprised but also more intrigued than she’d like to admit.
Link raised an eyebrow. “Oh, you haven't shut the idea down yet. Does that mean you’re interested~?”
“Just answer my questions, Link.”
“Well, yes, right now, right in that closet, and as long as we lock the door and you manage to stay quiet, nobody will even notice a thing. Besides, it’s probably gonna be a while before the game starts up again considering they have to find a way to clear the field of those cuccos without aggravating them too much.”
Zelda put a finger to her chin, thinking about what her response would be. “As much as I would love to… I don’t think my boyfriend would be very happy about it.”
“What? I am your boyfriend. Are you cheating on me?” Link asked, genuinely confused.
“No, my boyfriend is Link Wild, not this.... oversized, bloody, and dirty cucco.” Zelda teased with a wink. “Jokes aside though, you should rest up and take a breather. And before you begin to argue with me that you’re fine, you need to be at 100 percent if you want to win this game when it continues. You definitely don’t look like you’re at 100 percent now.”
Link crossed his arms and fake pouted once more, before simply smiling. “You’ve got a point. Fine, I’ll rest up.” He wrapped his arms around Zelda. “Rest with me though.”
Zelda rested her head on his chest. “Of course.” Her arms wrapped around his body.
Despite the chaos that had happened just minutes earlier, a peaceful moment was shared between the two as they felt each other’s warmth and fell asleep.