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Wild was lost.
An unusual occasion, considering how well the hero knew his Hyrule.
Time was also lost.
Far less unusual, as he was not in his own era.
The pair of heroes had been separated from their other companions, switching realms in the middle of a battle. They’d all scattered, and now Wild and Time were alone.
Neither of them were exactly surprised they were lost.
They were in the Lost Woods after all. It’s named that for a reason.
“This is your era, Champion?” Time furrowed his brow. The two had been wandering in circles for the past half hour, “Is there really no trick to get out of here?”
“Well, not really...” Wild muttered, “We’ll just have to keep looking. We’ll find a way out eventually.”
There was always the path to Korok Forest, if things got really bad. However, the last thing Wild wanted to think about was Korok Forest. He’d barely gone back after reclaiming the Master Sword, which was a bad enough experience to sour the woods for him completely. If only he’d kept a torch with him, they could’ve been out a few minutes after they came.
“Alright. Let’s keep moving, then,” Time sighed. The lost woods did not hold happy memories for him either.
“So,” Wild mumbled. “It’s pretty weird how the animals here, uhm, don’t get lost, right?”
Time nodded.
“There are so many here, though! Maybe I should, uh, hunt here more often!” Wild chuckled awkwardly.
Time shrugged.
Wild wanted to collapse into dust.
When the Champion was nervous, he never stopped talking. When he got too bad he’d struggle to talk at all, but he hated the endless need to fill empty air more.
Time didn’t mean to sound disinterested, but he was far too focused on not letting a teammate see him break down. That privilege was exclusive to the Captain, who’d seen him cry plenty of times during the war. Out of every landmark in Wild’s massive Hyrule, did they really need to land in the worst possible one?
(Wild might argue Gerudo desert would be a worse spot, but that was mostly because he hated the heat more than getting lost.)
Time took a shaky breath. “This is going nowhere.” He dropped his sword by a tree and plopped to the ground, “We should rest for a bit. You’re injured, aren’t you?”
“It’s not too bad, but yeah. You are too, though,” Wild took a seat beside Time. “I’ve seen my fair share of wounds, and you look pretty rough.”
“I’ll be fine. You don’t need to worry, Champion.”
“You can tell me not to, but I will anyway. That’s how most of us are.”
Time chuckled. “Of course, especially the rancher. He reminds me of Malon the way he worries.”
“Yeah… I hope he’s alright. The others, too. If we dropped in practically, they probably did too, huh?”
Time shrugged. “I suppose that could be the case.”
An uncomfortable silence followed.
The two had been alone together plenty of times before. The conversations had never been so stilted, so forced. Time must have motivated Wild’s uncomfortable look, because he finally spoke up.
“I apologize for not being more talkative. You’ve been holding up the conversation for the last hour,” he laughed quietly, staring down at his hands, “I don’t exactly have pleasant memories in these woods.”
Wild perked up.
He was crying.
“Ah—” The old man scrambled closer to Wild’s side. “I’m sorry. I said the wrong thing, I suppose.”
Wild laughed, a strange shift in tone, as he wiped the tears from his face. “Sorry, sorry! I was just—I was surprised you also felt that way!” He sniffled. “I thought I was just being the hyrule’s most awkward tour guide.”
Time silently thanked Hylia and turned back to Wild, almost laughing himself. “I was a tad too focused on not having a panic attack to notice your awkwardness, kid.”
“Oh, thank Hylia. I was a mess!”
“I’m really not known for my social skills either,” The older man smirked, “Malon tried to ask me on a date six times before I got the idea. She’s never let it go.”
Wild burst into a fit of laughter.
“Oh, oh, I have a good story!” He let out through giggles. “When I woke up from the shrine, I didn’t remember what anything was. So I walked into someone’s house while they were out-”
“Hylia, you did?”
“-that’s not even the best part! When they got back, I asked them what a bed was. They looked at me like I was insane!”
“Seems like you were!” Time let out a hearty laughter Wild had scarcely heard before. It was contagious enough for Wild to fall back into his own fit of laughs.
In a flash, the uncomfortable air was gone and the two heroes began to share their favourite antidotes from their lives they had.
“When I was a teenager,” Time began, still recovering from laughter, “I saw a friend of mine do an amazing flip.”
“Oh no…” Wild whispered, “I see where this is going.”
“So I—I tried to do it! I fell flat on my hand and broke my wrist. I had to beg one of the great fairies to fix it.”
“The first time I got a headshot on a monster, I celebrated so loud I alerted the entire camp it was guarding!”
“Believe me, we’ve all made that mistake!” Time chuckled.
It took a few more minutes of storytelling for Wild to realize they had somehow turned up at the entrance of the woods.
“No way! This is the exit!” He cried. “How did we even get here?”
Time looked Wild directly in the eyes, unblinking…
…and shrugged.
“Bastard.” Wild laughed.
The pair stepped out of the woods. It was already nighttime, and some nearby travellers were setting up camp.
“We should ask them for a bit of help.” Time said. “It’ll do us well.”
Wild nodded, and they made their way along the path to the small camp.
It took getting closer to realize the group wasn’t exactly made up of strangers.
“You two!” Twilight leapt out of his seat by the fire they had made, flailing his arms and almost hitting Wind in the face. “Where were you?!”
Wild and Time looked at eachother. Time smirked.
“Oh, Wild was teaching me how to ride a horse.”
Warriors blinked. “You own a horse.”
“I do. Is that related?”
“You’ve never ridden one.”
“Correction. You’ve never seen me ride a horse.”
Wind looked to Legend. “Wait, what’s a horse?”
Legend laughed so hard he fell out of his chair.
“Nope, nope, no jokes!” Twilight squeezed his way past the others and turned to Wild. “Really, where were you?”
Wild smiled.
“If the old man keeps practicing, he’ll be a pro rider soon! He’s a quick learner!”