His own blood streamed down from his temple, coalescing with his sweat, marring the dirt that crusted his visage.
The Darknut lunged at him, flailing its gargantuan blade towards his torso. He clumsily tripped backwards, and the edge of the weapon nicked his chest, tearing green cloth.
Sweat poured down his face in buckets, and he was, by now, positively gasping in exhaustion.
"A...second one. I didn't...count on a second one..."
He slowly hoisted himself up by thrusting his sword into the ground. Behind him lay the corpse of a previously slain Darknut.
The one in front, burdened yet shielded by its thick layer of protective armor, advanced slowly towards him.
It swung once more, vertically downwards, causing him to sidestep. He threw himself ahead and forced his sword into the shoulder joint, deep within the bulky armor. With a yell sprouting from lungs that have already become hoarse with weariness, he twisted his blade, then swiped it across the entire length of the Darknut's upper chest, from shoulder to shoulder.
The screech of metal upon metal was deafening to his ears.
His senses overwhelmed, he stumbled backwards and plunged down onto his posterior, his head throbbing with pain, his limbs weighed by absolute fatigue.
He didn't even have the time to complete his groan before his shadow stretched outwards, from the ground up, and spoke.
"What do you think you're doing?" it hissed. "Don't you remember the one you fought only moments ago?"
Its warning snapped him back from his dreariness to the corporal world, and only just then did he realize that the weapon, which just previously had brought him skirting treacherously close to death, was now barreling towards him, akin to a bullet.
He hurled himself to the side ungracefully, and the Darknut's blade sliced a deep laceration in his side.
Crimson spurt forth from his fresh wound, and he let out a sharp bellow of agony.
The Darknut, still very much alive, its armor cast aside, drew from its holster a thinner, longer blade. Its movements thrice as nimble, it sped forward and slashed.
His shadow materialized once more, molding itself into an impish shape, and summoned from its head a molten orange hand, which promptly stopped the assault in its tracks.
The imp turned towards him, its elongated third hand still holding the struggling Darknut in place.
"Pray tell, Link, how long are you just going to sit there, useless? Or is it that you want to die? Get UP, already."
He gritted his teeth, both in frustration and pain.
Did she expect him to be that idiotic? He remembered perfectly the way that the previous one had shed its armor. He thought, however, that he had wounded this one fatally before it had the chance to do the same.
He glanced briefly in its direction, witnessing the glistening red lining the Darknut's chest wound. The blood had already started to dry.
Evidently, he had not cut deeply enough.
Regardless, he heaved himself up, dragging his sword along the dirt in the process.
"Thanks, Midna," he muttered, gazing in the imp's direction.
She sighed.
"Someone has to look after you, lest you cast yourself into an early demise."
With that, she released her hold on the Darknut, and dove back into Link's shadow.
Link watched it stand straight, rising head and shoulders above him, casting its own shadow above his entire form.
He felt his hand already weakening its grip upon his sword hilt, his vision blurring, his blood smearing the tanned tones of his skin and staining the once-bright green of his tunic dark.
This was not courage.
It jabbed and swiped. Link zipped and dodged, to less avail than before.
On one particularly wide arc, Link rolled himself under and stabbed upwards. It swerved its head aside, and avoided the strike. It retaliated, and Link nearly had his arm severed.
This was not bravery.
It then slashed upwards, and tore the base of Link's wrist. His hand, caught in a sudden convulsion of pain, let go of his shield. Link, defenseless, found his heart targeted next.
He let out a strangled yell, and hastily backed away.
He was no hero.
The Darknut advanced, and Link feared for his life as a human most certainly would.
It was adrenaline, not blessed empowerment, that allowed Link to charge blindly forward and let loose a furious flurry of attacks.
It was fear, not heroics, that allowed him to brush aside the Darknut's weapon and plunge his blade into its body.
It was desperation, not distinction, that allowed him to plant his foot on his sword's hilt, and thrust it so deep that it gored through the other side.
The Darknut ceased all movement, and toppled backwards, as a statue would. Link collapsed on top of it.
He lay there, still, for the longest time, face somber, hands tarnished in blood, his tunic drenched in it.
He then wept. Tears streamed uncontrollably down his cheeks, and he could taste their salt as it mixed in with the metallic aroma of the blood in his mouth. He took great, shuddering gasps, and dry-heaved. A pool of saliva slid from his open jaw.
What energy he had left, he used to drag himself toward the stone wall of the cavern, and rest his back against it.
Link vaguely registered Midna sifting up from his shadow, to hover in front of him.
When she said nothing, he gazed pleadingly at her.
"I...I didn't ask for this," he implored her to understand.
When she remained silent, he continued.
"Being chosen...as a hero. What...what is that supposed to mean, exactly? Before all of this, I was...nothing at all but a ranch-hand."
He looked down at his blistered, bloodied palm.
"I'm not special," he whispered. "How can I be? Did I receive...training, o-or was I even told of my role before any of this...?"
Midna drifted closer and swiped away one of his stray tears.
"Why was I picked?" Link wailed, akin to a child. "How am I expected to handle such...such..." he was cut off by another shuddering sob.
Midna understood, even as she narrowed her eyes.
He held no significant properties of prestige or grandeur. No one could ever truly be a hero, and he certainly was no exception.
Life or death battles were a thing of raw natural selection, and reality itself was harsh and unforgiving, cruel to the bone. People, the princess of his world, the Goddesses; they all expected from him nothing less than the ideal, nothing less than a performance cut from the same cloth as legends.
But legends were false, and hold no true place in the universe.
He couldn't be a hero. Miracles were not his trade.
Regardless, he was sent on a quest. He was chosen, savior or not. Whether or not he becomes a champion is up to him alone, and not some flimsy promise of a foretold future, one brimming with superficial triumph and selflessness.
Blood, sweat, tears, and heart were all he had.
And as Midna brushed aside strands of damp hair from his now-sleeping form, she determined to the unforgiving world, defiantly, that if she had her way, it would be all he would ever need.
Author's Note:
I had this little blurb of an idea bored into my head when I considered, from a grimmer viewpoint, the reality of Link's predicament. Always sent, as part of every "heroic" bloodline, at the Goddesses' whimsies, into impending danger. He traverses dungeons and faces bloodthirsty beasts on a daily basis, and never bats an eye. I chose Twilight Princess as the setting, simply because it seemed the closest to how Link might have fared in more realistic bearings. Exactly where he and Midna are is arbitrary, as I thought that Link's plight would seem more significant if there was less information to clutter it.
Random Quotation of the day:
"I have entered upon a performance which is without example, whose accomplishment will have no imitator. I mean to present my fellow mortals with a man in all
the integrity of nature; and this man shall be myself."
- The Confessions, by Jean Jacques Rousseau