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It started when Wild’s bow snapped mid-fight.
Hyrule (who was covering him) heard the crack and the sharp swear that accompanied it, and a quick glance confirmed the situation. Wild caught his eye and smiled sheepishly. He was out of bows.
Hyrule offered his own, but Wild waved him away.
“I’ve only got bomb arrows left anyway,” Wild muttered, pulling out a spear and leaping from his boulder perch.
Hyrule shrugged. He was ok at archery, but they could just as easily take care of the remaining enemies on foot.
Wild headed left and Hyrule went right; he remembered seeing an enemy archer off that way and wasn’t sure if Wild had scored that one yet.
Hyrule found the archer, a moblin far afield, at the same time it raised its bow. He followed its line of sight, and felt his blood freeze.
It was aiming for Wars.
Wars, who had his back turned.
Wars, who was locked in combat with a stalfos.
Hyrule’s back leg pushed off far too slowly as he took a step forward.
One
“Wars!” Hyrule shouted in warning, reaching, hoping.
The captain grimaced, tilting his head to see what the fuss was about. Their eyes locked. Hyrule must have been making a truly terrible face, because Wars’s eyes widened, and he shoved against the stalfos, causing it to stagger back.
The captain's head turned, eyes darting —slow, too slow—! frantically searching for the cause of Hyrule’s alarm, but the angle was off. There were too many enemies, too much happening. A flash of fire to the left, the jingle and clank of a hookshot chain, mud and grunts and the sun warming the top of their heads to something just past comfortable. The stalfos took a swing and the captain had to block, turning back to the fight with a grimace, eyebrows angled down, sharp, dangerous.
A bowstring drew taught, and Hyrule felt impossibly slow. He leaned forward, willing himself to move, but it felt like running through water, the whole world distilled into a precious few crystalline seconds, holding his legs back and dragging him down, down, down.
Finally, finally, his forefoot touched down, and he planted it firmly, launching himself forward.
Two
His arms swung, adding to his momentum. There was still time.
Hyrule had decided long ago that he wanted to help people, to protect, to save. At first he’d wanted to be a bold and adventurous knight of Hyrule, one that the skalds and elders would remember in lays told around the campfire in the black of night. That was why he’d wandered out into the world in the first place, why he’d agreed to help an old woman on the road all those years ago, why he’d kept going even after that.
He wanted to help, and people, strangers, had responded to that in turn, had reached back out to him with small kindnesses and help of their own. Something at the deepest core of his being had caught alight in the face of that kindness, had driven him forward through the night. He’d glowed in the heart of that bright flame, every small kindness just as precious and worthy as a grand deed in his times of need.
In the moments when he felt most alone, he would hold its ember close in the dark and tell himself, just one. If he could make that same difference for just one person, as others had for him, the pain and sweat and tears would all be worth it.
Wars.
Wars embodied everything Hyrule admired about people. He was brave, he was smart, he was charismatic, put together, level headed when everyone else lost focus in the heat of the moment. And, as they all were in their own ways, he was kind. Wars was exactly what Hyrule had always imagined a knight should be. Everything Hyrule had wanted for himself.
Wars, who laughed at his jokes and joined in them, too. Wars, who had recognized him as an equal.
Wars, his friend.
Hyrule touched ground, and pushed off.
Three
The bowstring released. The arrow flew.
Hyrule watched it fly, too slow and too fast all at once. He was still several steps away from Wars, who had turned back to him. Wars, whose eyes widened in dawning horror at Hyrule’s approach, who realized too late what was happening.
No! Wars mouth moved, but Hyrule did not hear the words.
He could make a difference here. He would make a difference here.
He was still too far, if he could just reach—
He pushed the niggling doubt aside. He had no other choice. He would reach.
Hyrule took a fourth, final step, and leapt into range.
He whipped out his boomerang midair and threw it with practiced ease. It spun across the battlefield, snagging the arrow midflight before arching back to Hyrule with its prize in tow.
Sweet, free arrow.
Hyrule snatched his goods out of the air and saluted as he continued his sprint right past a stunned captain, a laugh escaping his mouth at the sight.
Like that quiet grey at the edge of night that eventually grows into a beaming dawn, Hyrule had come to the realization that he, too, was a person worth saving.
He would do anything for his friends, and that required being alive to do so. Also it was kind of lame to die in front of your friend and make them watch when you could live for them instead.
He impaled the archer with his sword, and turned with a grin and a snap to point at Wars, who had just felled the stalfos and was halfway through turning around to see what exactly had happened. The captain sighed at the familiar display, mouth twitching upwards at the corners before turning back to the fight at hand.
Hyrule leapt to join him.