‘hang on, i’ve got you’ from the angst prompts for firestar and hurt!bramblepaw? Thank you!!
When the Bough Breaks
Title is from “Rock-a-bye Baby.” Fic takes place during The Prophecies Begin: The Darkest Hour.
Bramblepaw slipped through the undergrowth, nose to the ground and mouth open to inhale the scents of the forest. A prickle across his shoulders, a constant shiver, kept him aware of his mentor’s gaze.
For once, though, Firestar was watching Bramblepaw because they were training—not because the leader distrusted his own apprentice.
Bramblepaw bared his fangs at the thought. He knew what the clan thought of him and Tawnypaw; he knew they were expected to turn on ThunderClan and run for their father at the earliest opportunity, no matter that their mother and all they knew was on this side of the thunderpath, but he didn’t care. The clan would be proven wrong.
But Firestar’s opinion mattered to him. The fact that his own mentor, who spent countless portions of the day with him, thought he would betray his clan… thought that was the kind of cat Bramblepaw was…
That fact dug its claws into Bramblepaw’s heart with every distrustful look.
Bramblepaw lashed his tail, then snarled when it caught in the thorns of a nearby bush.
“Come on,” he hissed, tugging at his tail, and then, “come on!”
His tail sprang free on the second tug, and Bramblepaw stumbled at the sudden shift in weight. One step. Two.
Leaves rustled below him, and Bramblepaw looked down just in time to see the ground crumple and fall into itself. He yowled, trying to leap free, but his paws tangled in a strange material, sending him into the dark below.
<line break>
Bramblepaw didn’t think he was unconscious long. In fact, he was sure of it, because when he managed to open his eyes and squint up at the sunlit sky above him, Firestar was framed against an opening several tail lengths up the wall of an earthen pit. His mentor peered down at him, front paws kneading the edge and making loose dirt fall into the hole.
“Bramblepaw?” Firestar called. “Are you awake?”
“‘M awake,” Bramblepaw mumbled, then coughed. It felt like he had a hairball stuck in his throat, but he’d bet it was just from the dirt cloud around him. “I’m awake!” he said again, louder this time.
“Thank StarClan,” Firestar muttered.
Bramblepaw stared up at his mentor. He didn’t think he’d been meant to hear that, but everything echoed in the hole, so the words had reached him easily.
“Are you hurt?” Firestar asked.
“No!” A headache from where he seemed to have hit his head, but that was all.
“Are you sure?”
What, did Firestar not trust him to even take stock of his own body? Bramblepaw glared up at his mentor. The sun behind him cast his front in shadow, but it lit the edges of his body in gold like he was Thunder himself come down from StarClan. That thought just made Bramblepaw angrier, so he scrambled to his paws to prove he was fine—
And then fire licked up his front left leg, and Bramblepaw yowled in pain as he tucked it up into his body and off the ground, tail waving to try and steady himself on his other three legs.
“Bramblepaw?!”
Was Firestar’s voice anxious? Bramblepaw’s head swam from the combined pain of his headache and his throbbing leg, but he forced himself to squint up at his mentor again.
“Fine!” he called up. “Just… uh…”
Bramblepaw stared at his injured leg. The lowest joint was swollen, and the paw itself was at a weird angle.
He didn’t need Cinderpelt to tell him he’d dislocated his paw.
“Fox dung,” he muttered.
“Bramblepaw?”
Bramblepaw opened his mouth to say he was fine—and then he closed it. Insisting he wasn’t injured when Firestar would be able to see it for himself in no time would do nothing but tell the leader he was right to distrust Tigerstar’s son.
Dirt clumps sprinkled onto his head, making Bramblepaw’s ears twitch, and he looked up to see Firestar crouched even closer to the hole’s edge than he had been before, head and shoulders close to the ground while his tail waved behind him for balance.
“Are you trying to fall in?” Bramblepaw called up crossly.
Firestar sat back. “If you would just answer me—”
“I—” don’t lie “—I’ll be up in a second.”
Even from the bottom of the pit, Bramblepaw could see the way Firestar’s eyes narrowed on him.
“Are you sure? I can come down—”
Bramblepaw didn’t give Firestar a chance to finish. If his mentor jumped into the pit, there was no guarantee either of them would make it out, and he certainly wasn’t going to wait around for Firestar to fetch help from one of his other distrustful clanmates. He heard enough from them already without being the apprentice who got stuck in a hole.
No. Dislocated paw or not, Bramblepaw would get out of this mess on his own.
There wasn’t much room to run—the pit was a mere two fox lengths across—but Bramblepaw did his best, backing up and then darting forward again, his good forepaw digging into the dirt wall and propelling him upwards while his back legs pushed off the ground.
Bramblepaw made it up the wall far enough that his eyes were just below Firestar’s—and then he began to fall back down again.
He struck out with both forepaws, regardless of the pain that seared up his leg from the dislocated joint, but the dirt around the pit’s edge was too loose to claw a hold in.
Then fangs sank into his scruff, and Bramblepaw’s body jolted to a stop and swayed over the pit’s opening, like a bird’s nest dislodged by a storm and caught haphazardly on a branch.
“Hang on.”
If Bramblepaw hadn’t known that Firestar was the only cat nearby, he wouldn’t have recognized the voice. The words came out as a garbled growl, caught as they were behind fangs and fur.
Firestar had him.
“I’ve got you,” his mentor said, and Bramblepaw sagged with relief.
Then the wind blew, the dirt crumbled, and the bird’s nest shook.
Bramblepaw fell again, and this time, Firestar fell with him.
<line break>
The journey back to consciousness took longer the second time. Bramblepaw felt like he was clawing through mud, dragged down by the pain that radiated from every bit of his body.
But someone called his name, over and over again, and Bramblepaw couldn’t ignore him.
“Firestar?” he mumbled. His tongue sat heavy and dry in his mouth, mashing the syllables together till they came out wrong, but a nose pressed to his cheek in response, cold and soothing.
“I’ve got you,” Firestar said. Something wet rasped over Bramblepaw’s forehead and smoothed the fur there. He forced his eyes open, disbelieving, but there his mentor was, bathing him like they were queen and kit.
Bathing him like Firestar had never looked at Bramblepaw with distrust.
Anger ran through his body, jolting him further awake. Bramblepaw bared his fangs, hissing, and tried to scramble away. His mentor leaned backward and hissed back at him, ears laid flat against his head, but then Bramblepaw’s dislocated paw brushed against the ground and anything he might have said washed away in a torrent of pain.
Instead of words, pained mewls fell, unstopping, from his mouth; instead of the dirt hole, StarClan lit up his vision, too bright flashes blinding against a shadowed background.
Instead of clean forest scent, the iron taste of blood filled his nose on every panting inhale.
Then a body wrapped around him, fur stiff but warming, and a cheek rubbed against his, hesitant but there.
The heavy, coniferous scent of ThunderClan told him that no matter the stiffness, no matter the hesitance, he was safe.
Bramblepaw gave himself three seconds of dizziness, then focused his eyes on the orange cat beside him.
Even lying on the ground, Firestar seemed larger than normal. His fur stuck into the air in a haphazard mess of fearful warning, the aftermath of falling into a hole, and drying blood from a torn-up shoulder. He loomed over Bramblepaw, but he no longer looked like a mythological figure.
Dirty, beaten, and bloody, Firestar was nothing less than Bramblepaw’s leader and no more than any other cat.
“There you are,” Firestar said. “You’ve dislocated your paw, so don’t move, ok?”
Bramblepaw huffed through his nose and closed his eyes again. The pain had sucked all the anger right out of him, so if Firestar wanted to pretend that all was fine between them—that they trusted each other completely; that Tigerstar didn’t taint their past, present, and future—Bramblepaw wouldn’t stop him. His mentor’s care soothed the raw wound of his leader’s distrust.
“You must be tired,” Firestar murmured. “A patrol will find us eventually; you can sleep till then.”
His tongue rasped between Bramblepaw’s ears once more, lulling him into a doze and a dream of a different world where his father was not Tigerstar.
<end fic>
Thank you for reading! I hope you all enjoyed.
If you're interested in sending me a fic prompt, you can find my guidelines linked in my header.
Hi, happy 10 year Musketeers anniversary! I was hoping you could do a gifset from S3E10 showing the parallels of Porthos stopping d’Artagnan from running into the burning Garrison after Constance, and then Athos stopping Porthos from running in after d’Artagnan? Both scenes occur in roughly the 6:00-7:05 minute timeframe of the episode. Thanks so much, I love your gifsets!
Could you write a fic where Thunderclan is attacked and Brambleclaw and/or Squirrelflight has to protect Lion/Holly/Jay as little kits in the nursery? Thank you!!
WARNING for graphic (though canon-typical) depictions of violence, blood, and gore.
Brambleclaw paced the stone floor of the hollow, checking on various last-second battle preparations around camp. A WindClan patrol had been spotted crossing the border, and though ThunderClan had little time to prepare, they were taking advantage of every second it took for WindClan to reach them.
Firestar had taken Brightheart, Cloudtail, Stormfur, and Ashfur with him to protect the main tunnel. While just five cats, they had both experience and the narrow tunnel itself. The dirt tunnel had been entrusted to Thornclaw, with Spiderleg, Mousepaw, Brook, and Whitewing by his side.
Brambleclaw had also asked Whitewing to look after Berrypaw for him. She was still young, but she was as even-tempered as her mother and as sassy as her father; she would handle Berrypaw’s joking personality just fine while also keeping him safe.
With his apprentice taken care of, Brambleclaw was free to focus on the clan as a whole.
Dustpelt and Brackenfur pressed extra thorns and vines around the nursery, and Dustpelt only took the time once to press his cheek to Ferncloud’s—they had no time for a longer moment, even though the she-cat had only just learned she was pregnant again.
For that reason, she was stationed at the nursery entrance with Sorreltail, who had entrusted her five-moons old kits to Daisy. The tortoiseshell shot frequent looks and mews over her shoulder, though she didn’t break from her station, and only took a single moment to lick her own mate’s cheek.
Brambleclaw didn’t know how she could stand it, being so close to her kits and yet so far with danger on the way. It would have been one thing if Brackenfur had been with the kits, but to have both parents just feet away…
Brambleclaw let his gaze linger on the nursery entrance for one beat—two—and then forced himself to turn towards the opposite end of camp.
Neither he nor Squirrelflight were with their kits, and that was fine. Squirrelflight was out hunting with Sandstorm, getting some mother-daughter time and stretching her legs, but they would be home as soon as Birchfall told them about the attack. And Brambleclaw—Brambleclaw was taking care of the clan, just like he should be. The kits were with Daisy. Safe in the nursery, guarded by Sorreltail and Ferncloud. Their stomachs were no longer round with milk, and though they were still small enough that even an apprentice would find it easy to bat them around, they didn’t need Brambleclaw beside them.
He’d already been to visit them anyway. He’d stolen just a few moments with them after he and Firestar had sorted everyone into their positions, wound his tail around them to pull them tight against his stomach, till Lionkit and Hollykit scrunched up their little pink noses at a face-full of his fur and Jaykit tried to fight his way out with tiny kitten claws.
Then Brambleclaw had bent down to nose at them one by one and to inhale their scents before leaving for battle. Lionkit’s fur had spiked up, making him look even bigger than usual. Jaykit had leaned into his touch, ears flat against his head. And Hollykit had looked at him with wide green eyes before asking what would happen if WindClan broke into the nursery.
Brambleclaw had only been able to say, “It will be ok. They’d have to go through me.” Then he’d had to stand and leave them there, to go be deputy for their clan, and only the knowledge that he would never leave if he looked back had kept him looking forward.
Brambleclaw hissed in frustration, but forced himself to keep his body language composed as he turned to Mousefur and Longtail. The two cats nodded to him from their position just inside the elder’s den; while technically elders, they were the feistiest elders Brambleclaw had ever known, and he knew they were prepared to fight for the lives of not just themselves, but any other cats.
Brambleclaw nodded back, took a breath—and almost jumped when a tail tapped his shoulder.
“Yes, Hazelpaw?” he asked, looking down. The apprentice had been running messages since the first report of a fast approaching WindClan patrol, but still had the energy to shift from paw to paw, claws already out and scraping against the stone.
“They’re here!” she said.
Brambleclaw tensed, his own claws unsheathing, and whirled to face the tunnel entrance. Two caterwauls rose through the air, one high and thready, the other low and long: Onestar and Firestar.
“Go to Dustpelt,” he told Hazelpaw, and she darted away. Her, Dustpelt, Brackenfur, and Brambleclaw himself were responsible for the inner hollow, making sure that if any WindClan cat slipped past the tunnels, they didn’t have a free shot at the nursery or elders.
Brambleclaw stalked around the hollow, ears swiveling, tail swinging low, searching for any sign of trouble. He could make out fighting from both tunnels now, angry screeches and pained yowls, but no calls for help.
The sharp scrape of claws on rock made him look up—but it was just Leafpool, peering out of the healer’s den towards the nursery. She startled when she saw him looking, and he twitched his tail at her. He wished he could do more to calm her, but his entire body was tense from nose to tail tip. She twitched her ears back at him, though, and then turned back into her den. Probably checking on herbs and other supplies. He didn’t know how she could stand waiting for the battle to end before doing anything when just waiting as the rear guard put him on edge.
Another scraping sound came, this time from the opposite direction, and Brambleclaw whirled around, stomach dropping at Dustpelt’s angry yowl: “They’re coming down the sides!”
Whitetail and Weaselfur bared their fangs at them, even almost upside down as they were, claws dug into the stone walls and tails carefully balanced, and then jumped the last fox-length into the hollow. More WindClan fangs glinted above them, but Brambleclaw didn’t bother paying attention to them—he’d already leapt at Weaselfur, crashing into the orange-and-white tom.
From the corner of his eye, he could see Hazelpaw lashing out at Whitetail, only for her to be sent rolling by a spiteful paw to the head.
“Fight someone your own age,” the deceptively small she-cat hissed.
In retaliation, Dustpelt yowled and barreled shoulder-first into Whitetail.
The sounds of battle, once limited to the tunnels, filled the hollow. Claws threw torn tufts of fur into the air, and blood spattered against the stone. Bodies writhed around one another, rolling and standing and falling, all the fur patterns blending into one another until it was hard to tell one cat from another, ThunderClan from WindClan, though Brambleclaw did see the distinctive sight of Cloudtail and Whitewing fighting back to back, father and daughter a mirror image of one another with their long-furred white pelts, Berrypaw a fluff ball of cream beside them.
Cloudtail was supposed to be with Firestar. Whitewing and Berrypaw were supposed to be with Thornclaw. Were any cats left in the tunnels, Brambleclaw wondered, or were they all in the hollow? Had ThunderClan retreated, or had they run to the rescue when Brambleclaw’s patrol was overwhelmed?
Was there any difference, when the end result was the same: ThunderClan once again fighting for their camp, while the camp itself stood hard and unmoving, stone walls pressing in on them.
Blood dripped from scratches and claw marks along Brambleclaw’s body where cats had gotten past his guard. The wounds throbbed in time with his heartbeat, and his lungs worked overtime to try and catch his breath even when there was no time to rest.
For the countless time, Brambleclaw’s gaze slid past the cat he was fighting to the nursery entrance. Ferncloud and Sorreltail still stood strong, backs to each other and facing out, dappled gray beside tortoiseshell—but even as Brambleclaw watched, they slid apart just enough to leave a space between their hind quarters, a small space, but big enough for a lean WindClan cat to slip through.
Tornear latched on to Brambleclaw’s shoulder with his fangs, but Brambleclaw barely felt it, tearing himself free, uncaring of the way that ripped the wound and made it larger, focused more on the beat of stone beneath his paws as he launched himself across the hollow, between the two queens, into the nursery, and—
Conflicting instincts hit Brambleclaw all at once. All six kits—Honeykit, Poppykit, Cinderkit, Lionkit, Hollykit, and Jaykit—were squeezed into one nest in the corner. Daisy stood in front of them with her hackles raised, fangs bared, and fur fluffed to twice its usual size. The usually gentle queen looked ready to send dogs yelping for their twolegs.
And before Daisy, half-turned back towards Brambleclaw and calm as death, stood Crowfeather. The same cat who Brambleclaw had traveled with for moons, braving thunderpaths and teasing each other on long walks. Huddling together in the cold, the thick-furred Brambleclaw, Tawnypelt, Stormfur, and Feathertail on the outside while Squirrelpaw smothered the lone short-furred Crowpaw in the middle. Fishing each other out of rivers when the RiverClan cats tried to teach them how to fish. All the arguments, and all the times they had shared food and tongues.
Brambleclaw had been happy to make it back to the old forest, but he had mourned the little family they had created together.
And now Crowfeather faced him in ThunderClan’s nursery, Brambleclaw’s own kits hiding in the corner, and Brambleclaw’s heart longed to share tongues again, to ask how his old friend was doing, while knowing neither of them would sheathe their claws.
Not while Crowfeather stood between Brambleclaw and his kits.
“Why are you here?” Brambleclaw rasped. He took a step to the side, trying to get between Crowfeather and Daisy, but the other tom stayed put, cocking his head to the side.
“My clan is attacking yours.”
“No,” Brambleclaw growled. He swiped a paw across the ground, claws scoring through the soft dirt. “Why are you here? In the nursery?” He could think of only two reasons a warrior would invade the nursery, and he couldn’t believe Onestar would stoop so low. Couldn’t believe Crowfeather would go through with it. But—
Crowfeather straightened, tail twitching. “Too few kits have been born since we arrived at the Lake. But ThunderClan is strong.” His gaze turned towards the kits, and Brambleclaw didn’t wait for him to turn back.
He leapt on Crowfeather, bowling the smaller cat over and rolling him away from the kits. Daisy’s cream-colored legs darted about in his peripheral vision, but Brambleclaw focused on the narrowed, cool blue eyes a single claw’s length from his face, on the furious hiss that cut off when Crowfeather snapped at him, missing only when Brambleclaw pushed himself free to stand, finally, between Crowfeather and the kits.
Except he was too close, Brambleclaw realized. His back paws brushed against the feathers and moss of Daisy’s nest, and Daisy herself stood by the nursery entrance.
Brambleclaw had gotten where he wanted to be, but Daisy had been forced to move. They’d just switched places.
Brambleclaw crouched lower, readying himself for whatever Crowfeather’s next move would be, and his tail fur brushed against soft kitten ears. Lionkit mewed, quieter than he had ever heard him, and the noise burrowed into Brambleclaw’s heart. All his aches and pains faded away.
His kits were only three moons old; they shouldn’t have to hear the sounds of battle yet.
“Coward,” he spat, and leapt upon Crowfeather again.
The lean cat jumped to the side and out of the way of Brambleclaw’s bulk. He lashed out with a front paw, but Brambleclaw’s side was only exposed for a moment before he whirled around, putting himself back in-between Crowfeather and the kits.
On the journey to and from the sun-drown place, all the cats had sparred with each other—both to complete Crowpaw and Squirrelpaw’s teachings, and to keep their own fighting instincts intact. Brambleclaw was well-used to Crowfeather’s strategies and weaknesses.
That also meant Crowfeather was used to his.
Brambleclaw took one step to the side to get a better look at Daisy and the nursery entrance, gaze sliding past Crowfeather, and the WindClan warrior pounced, battering his face with an outstretched front paw twice before Brambleclaw blocked the third strike with his own paw.
The move put all his front weight on the side of his injured shoulder, and Brambleclaw staggered at the sudden pain. Instead of being able to retaliate, he opened himself back up to another strike from Crowfeather.
Brambleclaw swore he saw stars before he shook it off. He couldn’t give Crowfeather the chance to get the advantage. Couldn’t give the other warrior time to plot.
Brambleclaw reared up on his hindlegs, revealing his soft belly but taking the weight off his injured shoulder, and hit Crowfeather upside the head, knocking him to the ground. He loomed over him, eyes narrowed to slits and fangs bared in a snarl.
“You really thought we’d just let you take our kits? Use them as hostages, raise them as your own—”
Pain split through Brambleclaw’s stomach, and he let out a cry and staggered. Only the worried shriek of his name from his kits let him keep his feet to face Crowfeather, who had rolled over and found his own feet again, one back paw gleaming.
Brambleclaw knew that even though he couldn’t see the blood against the black fur, that Crowfeather had ripped into his stomach with a single strong blow.
Despite being the cat to do it, Crowfeather’s gaze seemed almost sorrowful, ears tipped back and tail low—and then Daisy crashed into his back in one giant, hissing, spitting puffed up ball of fur. Crowfeather hissed back, and his claws scrabbled in the dirt, but Daisy was set firmly out of his reach, claws dug into his shoulders and haunches.
For a moment, Brambleclaw thought that might be how he died: Braced on shaky legs, blood dripping from his stomach, watching his old friend be torn apart by a furious queen. He wanted to move, to do something, anything, so that they could all live—him and his kits, Daisy and Crowfeather—but he was barely keeping his feet while standing still. He wasn’t sure he even had the energy left to do more than just breathe.
Then the thistle boundary rattled, and Sorreltail and Ferncloud burst into the nursery. Crowfeather crashed to his side, hurling Daisy to the ground, and then tore himself loose to dart between Sorreltail and Ferncloud once more and out into the center of camp.
None of the queens bothered chasing him. Ferncloud ran right to Brambleclaw and shoved her shoulder under his, while Daisy staggered past him, breath shaky, toward the kits. Sorreltail ran out of the nursery, but Brambleclaw could hear her calling for Leafpool.
“WindClan?” Brambleclaw asked. One of his paws slipped, but he caught himself. “Are they—?”
“Gone,” Ferncloud said. “That tom was the last. Lay down, Brambleclaw, it’s alright.”
Brambleclaw started to nod, but his vision blurred, so he settled for just following her directions instead. His legs folded over themselves, clumsy as a newborn kit, but with Ferncloud’s help he didn’t just fall down. She had even, he marveled at the softness, landed him in a nest. He inhaled the scent of lichen, poppyseeds, and oak.
“Squirrelflight will be upset her nest is bloody,” he said, but couldn’t stop himself from purring. He was in his mate’s nest, and his kits were—his kits were safe, right?
Brambleclaw fought to get his paws underneath himself again, when three little bundles hurtled into his chest one after another.
“Your kits are right here,” Ferncloud said. “Stay still. Leafpool! He’s right here.”
Pawsteps hurried his way, but not even the following flash of pain from pressure on his stomach could bring Brambleclaw to open his eyes. When had he closed them? Maybe—maybe when he laid down?
“Will Brambleclaw be alright?” a tiny voice asked. Hollykit.
Another voice scoffed. “He’ll be fine. The WindClan cat is gone, so there’s nothing to be afraid of.” Jaykit. Unsure, no matter how firm he tried to be.
“He’ll be fine,” a third voice echoed, more firmly than the second. Lionkit.
And then—“Brambleclaw?!” a fourth voice cried, and pawsteps thudded in the dirt beside him. “Kits?!” Squirrelflight.
Brambleclaw sighed, and the last of his fear left him as he slid into sleep.
<line break>
“I’m sorry,” Squirrelflight whispered. “I should have been here.”
<line break>
Cold seeped into his bones, and bodies pressed into his. Brambleclaw curled into himself, chin tucked around three kitten-sized pockets of warmth.
<line break>
A paw slipped wet moss into his mouth, and someone nosed his forehead. “Thank you,” they breathed. “Thank you.”
<line break>
Brambleclaw’s chin shifted up and down in a steady rhythm, and when he opened his eyes and looked down, a rusty purr rumbled through him. A pile of orange-gray-black kittens slept against him, their little stomachs rising and falling with each synchronized breath. Occasionally, Lionkit would let out a snort, joining in the chorus of Jaykit’s snores and Hollykit’s whistles.
An orange muzzle speckled with white freckles leaned into his view. Brambleclaw looked up into forest-green eyes, and he leaned up to meet his mate’s nuzzle with one of his own. The simple move drained him of more of his strength than he expected, but he didn’t regret it. Not when Squirrelflight laid down in front of him so they could stay eye-to-eye.
Not when she repeated, “I’m sorry. I should have been here,” and he could finally reply:
“You’re here now.”
Not when he fell asleep again with his family safe around him, and knew they would still be there when he woke again.
<line break>
He didn’t know that through the forest and across the moor, Crowfeather lay alone. Thinking not of his own kit and mate in the nursery, but of a different litter. Of one kit with his black fur, and one with his long legs, and one with Leafpool’s golden stripes. Of an old friend bleeding into the dirt to protect them.
Of his own leader demanding he prove his loyalty.
Crowfeather squeezed his eyes shut, and knew no harm would come to his kits.
Not if he or Brambleclaw had any say in it.
<end fic>
We're all going to ignore I just wrote another fic where I gave Brambleclaw a gaping stomach wound, right? Right?
Anyway, I loved writing this mix of hurt Brambleclaw and Bramble!Dad kitten fluff (and blatant "the queens are BAMF" propaganda), and I hope you guys enjoyed reading it! Please comment and/or reblog if you did!
Also, just a general celebration: This fic pushes me over 50k words in my "Tumblr Prompt/Ask Box Fill" series! I posted the first fic more than four years ago, though I didn't really pick up speed on the series until 2020. Still, this is a major achievement for me, and I appreciate everyone who has ever given me a prompt--I've loved filling them, giving back to the fandom community, and practicing my writing all at once. Thank you!
“hang on, i’ve got you” for warriors and wild? 👀 (hurt wild please) thank you!
Warriors stumbled across the field, over grass and flowers, the weight in his arms slowing him down and throwing him off balance.
“Warriors,” a voice moaned.
He chanced a glance down, then grimaced and looked away, wishing he hadn’t.
“Warriors, I’ll—I’ll be fine…”
Wild had always been skinny, more sinew than muscle, but the way Warriors held him just emphasized it. Wild’s legs hung over Warriors’s arm, and his head lulled against Warriors’s chest, bouncing with every step.
It was Wild’s arms that made Warriors’s heart ache the most, though. One arm was cradled in Wild’s lap, loose now instead of pressing against the gaping, bleeding hole like it had been at the start of their journey. The other dangled towards the ground, dripping a trail of blood.
“Hey, hey,” Warriors said, jostling Wild. “What happened to holding pressure, huh? You getting lazy, Wild? I never—I never thought I’d see the day.”
Wild grinned up at him, teeth bloody. Warriors wasn’t sure if it was from the bokoblin Wild had torn the throat out of with his bare teeth, or the bokoblin who had skewered Wild on a pike. If it was the former, it was a story to tell. If it was the latter—well, if it was the latter, it meant internal bleeding, but that was already a given, wasn’t it?
“Hyrule’s gonna fix you up real nice,” Warriors said. “But he might just kill you after. Huh, Wild?”
When we find the others went unsaid, but Warriors figured Wild heard it anyway. They had been separated when they went through a portal, but they had been lucky enough to land in Time’s world. There was only one place the others would go—even if Warriors and Wild had been unlucky enough to also land right in the middle of a group of bokoblins.
Realizing he hadn’t heard a response, Warriors jostled Wild again. “Hey, Wild, keep talking to me, ok? Twilight’s gonna want to hear your pretty voice.”
No answer.
“Wild?” Warriors glanced down, and the sight sent him stumbling over his own feet and to the ground.
Wild’s eyes were closed. His body, which had already seemed so limp before, appeared to sleep like the dead. Warriors prayed he wasn’t. Oh, by Hylia, Warriors prayed he was just unconscious.
“Wild?” Warriors rasped, and shook the boy even as he held him closer to his chest. “Wild?”
No answer—but then, even as Warriors watched, Wild’s chest moved up and down.
“Alright,” Warriors muttered. “Alright, alright.” He heaved himself to his feet. “You just hang on, ok? I’ve got you.” I’ve got you.
And Warriors soldiered on.
#
By the time Warriors reached the steps of the ranch, his pants had grown stiff with Wild’s drying blood. He hadn’t dared stop and test his heart rate, relying solely on the movement of Wild’s chest and the warmth of his breath on Warriors’s own throat. Wild was still alive—but Warriors didn’t know how long that would last.
“Time!” Warriors called. His voice stuck in his throat, and he coughed, then called again, “Time!”
The front door slammed open, and Warriors faltered, relief stealing the last bit of exhausted strength from his limbs. Time, Twilight—Legend, Sky—Four, Wind, and Hyrule, they were all there. Wild was saved.
Warriors grinned, and the last bit of his strength slipped away, sending him crashing down into Legend. The veteran’s arms wrapped around him, holding him close, and Warriors leant into him even as his own arms tightened around Wild’s unconscious body. He wouldn’t drop the boy—not so close to the end.
“Hyrule!” Legend called, and turned around. Warriors stumbled with him in a bit of an awkward dance, dragged along by the other man’s strength. Any other time, he would be threatening Legend with death, but right now Warriors only felt thanks. He could trust any and all decisions—the bodies of both himself and Wild—to the arms of the others. Warriors could sleep now.
The instant he felt the weight of Wild’s body lift, Warriors closed his eyes.
#
Warriors woke slowly, the smell of Malon’s cooking in his nose, and then all at once, when the weightlessness of his arms hit him. Jolting upright, he looked around the room wildly until his eyes landed on the bright blue of Wild’s tunic, hanging on a chair. And underneath it—
Warriors bolted from his own bed, throwing aside the sheets and grasping for Wild’s hand. Hyrule, sleeping on Wild’s other side, shot up with a shout.
“What have I said—! Warriors!” he squawked. “Don’t you dare tear that wound open again!”
Warriors stared down at Wild. The boy was unconscious, his usual messy yellow-blonde hair sorted into braids. The wound Hyrule mentioned was hidden under several layers of bandaging, but there was no blood bleeding through anymore.
“He’s ok?” Warriors asked, switching his gaze to Hyrule.
The traveler nodded slowly. “You got him here on time, Warriors.”
That wasn’t what Warriors had asked, but he ignored it in favor of the steady rhythm beneath his hand: Wild’s pulse.
Satisfied, Warriors slumped back onto his own bed just in time to see the rest of the Links come stumbling into the room, all in various states of disarray. Sky looked like he’d just woken from a nap, and Wind more hyper than the time he ate an entire block of chocolate. Time was at the back, Malon at his side, and his armor shined in the way that said he’d been using the task as a distraction again.
“You’re awake,” Twilight said, and Warriors nodded. “You got Wild here safely,” and Warriors scoffed. What part of the kid bleeding out when he arrived did the others not get?
“He’s alive,” Warriors said. What more could he ask for?
#
It took another two days for Wild to wake. In that time, Hyrule kept Warriors confined to the bed next to him—he’d apparently ‘overworked his body,’ whatever that meant, and the traveler didn’t trust him to stay still if he wasn’t in eye sight. Over the days, the other Links kept up a constant rotation in the room. The entertainment depended on the Link.
Wind could be counted on for stories of the ‘high seas,’ but Legend, for once, was near silent. Twilight did nothing but talk about Wild, which just reminded Warriors of his near failure, and Time waxed poetic about Malon’s eyes, which Warriors considered pointless with the real thing peeking in from time to time. Four let Warriors guide the conversation, which was nice, and Sky wanted to cuddle, which, for once in his life, Warriors just wasn’t interested in.
But it was just Hyrule and Warriors when it happened. Warriors was sharpening his sword, trying to ignore Hyrule checking on Wild’s injuries, when he heard a raspy, “Hyrule? Where—where’s Warriors? Is he alright?”
Warriors barked a single, disbelieving laugh, put down his sword, and leaned forward to poke Wild’s arm. “Am I alright? You’re the one who nearly bled out all over my good scarf.”
Hyrule turned and pushed Warriors back into his own bed, but Warriors’s attention was all on Wild’s stupid smile as he looked back at Warriors.
Wild wasn’t just alive, he was awake. Warriors didn’t think he’d ever be more thankful.
