This one I actually wrong months ago when my county was first put under "Shelter in Place" I held off posting it, thinking there was a good chance I could use it for Whumptober.

Prompt Eleven - Struggling

Timeline - Set shortly after Majora's Mask

Struggling

It had been huge news among the Kakariko Village residents. People went from one group to the next, talking in urgent worried voices. Someone had come down with The Fever in Hyrule Castle Town. The deadly sickness that has already taken many lives is nothing new to hear about. Its chokehold has been sweeping through the land of Hyrule for weeks now, with news of another death coming every day.

The initial breakout is said to have started among the Gerudo Thieves. Word around the village is that The Fever has struck over three quarters of the Gerudo's Tribe, and half the population had already been taken by the disease. Link did not know exactly how many women lived among the Gerudo, but he had been around them enough in his time travel experience to know that they were a mass number of people, and half of their population must have been at least hundreds if not thousands. Now The Fever was steadily spreading among the residents that lived around Lake Hylia, and its surrounding regions.

It had not yet come to the Village of Kakariko, but what made the news about The Fever now being at the Castle so big, was how close Hyrule Castle was to the Village. Only about a day's journey on foot, and the residents of Kakariko were always going to and from the Castle Market in order to do business or trading. The chances of the Village being inflicted with the disease had suddenly become much more likely

Link himself had not quite understood what was to be so fearful about 'The Fever' at the beginning. Growing up among the Kokiri that never left their sheltered woods, the forest children had never heard anything about plagues or pandemics. Sicknesses would go around Kokiri forest every year during the winter months, and pretty much everyone got sick. But there was never anything to panic about. They had to stay in bed a few days, while whoever lived nearby took care of them. After that, everything went back to normal again. It didn't take long for Link to learn that there were some sicknesses out there so bad, that you often didn't survive if you caught it. So it would make sense that panic would come around in fear of catching a life threatening illness.

With the amount of times Link has almost died during his adventures, the boy wasn't really all that worried about himself. His embedded heroic nature however caused him to worry about everyone else in Kakariko. This whole pandemic business had actually left him feeling quite helpless. Unlike the other times Hyrule had been in danger, there wasn't much he could do with battling a traveling sickness that was killing people. It would be so much easier if the sickness was a tangible thing he could just slaughter and it would all be over.

It only took a couple days after the announcement of fever in Hyrule Castle for Link's regular lifestyle to change drastically. He was helping out at the village mercantile, restocking the shelves when someone walked into the store and began talking to Ilia the store owner. Navi had drilled into him long ago about how eavesdropping was rude, and that he always should mind his own business. But in his mind, there was nothing wrong with eavesdropping as long as no one found out he was doing it. So Link slowed down his movements in an effort to perk up his ears and listen. "- six more people have fallen ill with The Fever. Sahasrahla had ordered us all to go into quarantine," the man who came in said to Ilia.

This was the not the first time Link had heard someone say something that made no sense to him. It had happened quite often when he had first left Kokiri forest, but after having a couple of adventures and distant travels under his belt it had been a long time since that's happened. This alone caused the child to completely drop what he was doing and go out to blatantly listen. Ilia had a horrified look plastered on her face at the news, "Oh no…" was all she was able to say.

"I know…" the man who had come in with the information responded also looking grave. "You'll need to close up the shop as soon as possible."

Close up the shop? It was barely midday. What was going on? "What's happening?" Link couldn't hold back his silence any longer.

The man looked over at Link. The boy had seen the man around the village from time to time since he had come to live here, but he did not recognize the man by name. "We're under quarantine now lad. You'd best head home as quickly as possible." After saying this the man tipped his hat too Ilia and left the shop.

"What's quarantine mean?" Link asked turning to the young shop owner.

Ilia just looked at him sadly, and with a deep sigh responded. "It's basically a form of home isolation. So you need to go back home, and don't leave again for any reason."

"For how long?" Link asked looking mystified. That sounded like something that would get boring really fast.

"Until Sahasrahla says its over…"

Sahasrahla is the head Elder of Kakariko Village, and Link had lived in the village long enough to know that whatever he said goes. There was no argument. So with that said, Ilia began getting everything ready to close the store, and Link had nothing else to do but grab his own stuff and head back to Anju's house.

After returning from Termina, Link had nowhere to go since returning to Kokiri Forest wasn't an option for him anymore. The forest was only for Kokiri and since he wasn't a real Kokiri, but instead a Hylian, and he would eventually turn into a skull kid or stalfos if he tried to return and live there. Impa had advised him to come to the village because there would be families there willing to take him in. Sure enough, almost at once Anju's family had welcomed him into their little chicken farm. Well… at least Anju and her mother welcomed him. Anju's father Mutoh hadn't been all that welcoming. Not that he had been unwelcoming, more like indifferent to the idea. He barely says a word to Link, spending most of his time complaining about how useless his workers are.

Link seemed to be the last one to get home, since the house was filled and a bust with conversation when he entered the house. Anju had been talking to her mother by the kitchen stove when he walked in, and all conversation stopped at his appearance. "Oh good Link, you made it back." Anju said turning her worried gaze onto him. "I was wondering if someone was going to need to go and fetch you. I assume you've been told the news."

"That we're under quara- something? Yeah," the boy replied with a sigh.

"Quarantine," Anju's mother corrected while her daughter made her way over to the boy and examined him with a critical eye. "Have you been feeling all right Link?" Anju asked, and ran a hand over his forehead to check for a temperature.

The young hero batted her hand away, "Yes I'm fine." He had a nasty suspicion that Anju was going to use this as an excuse to overly mother him.

Despite his gesture of annoyance, Anju continued looking for signs of illness. "If you ever don't feel well, I want to let us know right away. Understand?"

"Yes mother…" Link replied sarcastically, brushing away from the young woman's doting.

"This is all a bunch of hosh posh!" Mutoh exclaimed to the room at large as Link took a seat next to him at the table; and with a dark chuckle he added, "No one in the village has even come down with it yet!"

"Father shh!" Anju shushed him in a desperate voice, shooting a glance at the back bedroom. "Nana's trying to sleep!"

Mutoh growled in response but didn't say anything else. Link just looked around the room at large. Was anyone really expecting them all to stay in this house without leaving? The only times everyone was in the house together was at night when they were all asleep. The boy could already tell that this was not going to go very well. And as it turned out, Link had been absolutely right. Cabin fever set into the household by the next day, and it seemed like everyone was arguing with each other about everything. Link had not realized how much of a neat freak Anju's mother was before now. What went from occasional comments about cleaning up after oneself, quickly turned into her constantly barking out how messy everyone was.

Anju turned out to be a very pessimistic woman, which she must have learned from her mother. When Anju began voicing her worries about whatever consumed her thoughts at that moment. Her mother would not only agree with her, but began voicing her own concerns about the subject. Soon the two would feed off of each other until, according to their perspective the world was ending. Mutoh didn't seem to truly understand until now just how senile his mother in law actually was. And the woman's constant comments about things that didn't make sense, or mistaking everyone for someone else was a new topic he added to his list of things to complain about. Link in particular got tired of hearing the old man's complaints, and had never truly appreciated how easily he could escape from listening to him before the quarantine went into effect.

Though what actually annoyed the Hero of Time the most was everyone's constant bickering among each other. He made an effort not to participate in the bickering, which usually resulted in him being a silent mute among the babble. Luckily his original thinking that they all had to stay in the house wasn't entirely correct. They could venture outside to do whatever they wanted or needed to do, as long as they didn't leave the cucco farm. That is the only reason he hasn't gone crazy by now, and Link found himself spending more and more time with the cucco's, feeding and gathering their eggs. He was sometimes joined by Anju who seemed to use this chore as her own escape from the house.

They both silently came to a mutual agreement not to talk about anything that had to do with The Fever or quarantine, because the times they were both outside together; their conversations were carefully tread around current matters or there was no conversation at all. The days dragged on and on. After almost a fortnight in quarantine, Link began to wonder if battling through The Fever would be easier than staying cooped up with these people for even one more day. And keeping his cool while everyone else around him lost it was much harder to do than one would think. It was only a matter of time before he snapped.

Unfortunately, it had to happen when literally everyone in the house was present. When the quarantine was first announced, Anju had insisted that they at least eat dinner together every evening. Apparently in her mind household bonding would get them all much closer and make the whole ordeal easier to bear. Link however didn't think it was working very well. If anything, everyone took advantage of the extra ears to listen to their griping. "And now! Since we're so behind on our construction, the shooting gallery won't get completed by the deadline. Do you realize how many rupee's I put into that project!" Mutoh was grumbling to the table at large.

"If this doesn't pass soon, we're going to go into major debt and could lose the farm!" Anju's mother responded as she listened to her husband's ramblings about his business.

"Not to mention my lazy workers." Mutoh continued his rampage not appearing to be listening to what his wife as saying. "It's hard enough getting them to start working, with all this time off, it'll be a nightmare getting them back in the groove."

"Oh mother!" Anju cried in horror. "Where would we go?" And the two woman began their own rampage about how they were all about to live a homeless lifestyle. Being homeless wasn't that bad, Link had done it for a couple of years.

"Tortus would you please go get my knitting needles before Ruport gets ahold of them?" Anju's grandmother was looking at Link when she asked this, so she was probably addressing him. But everyone had become accustomed to just ignoring her when she got like this. She seemed to be under the impression that there was a dog wreaking havoc on the house.

Link was the only silent one at the table. Nursing a headache with one elbow propped up on the table, and his head resting in his palm. He really just wanted to go to his room and lay down, and he wasn't really all that hungry anyways. But he knew that if Anju ever found out about his current headache, she would completely freak; thinking it was The Fever coming upon him. If he really thought it was that, then he'd certainly say something, but the real reason his head was pounding was because of all their loud voices sniping, grumbling and complaining at each other. So it was best to just wait it out, silently push the food around on his plate and try to ignore the table talk. "Maybe I could get permission to go around selling eggs to the other villagers. I'm sure there are people in need of eggs by now; it would bring in a little extra rupees," Anju suggested to her mother.

"That will only buy us so much time, we may make more by selling the cuckoo's themselves- Mother what are you doing?" Anju's mother cut off what she was saying when Anju's grandmother suddenly stood up with an almost full plate of food.

"Rupert keeps whining, so I'm giving him some food," the old woman croaked out and spilled the whole plate on the ground.

Anju sighed at the mess she would not have to clean up, but Mutoh bristled angrily, "For Goddess's sake woman! There is no dog!"

"Please don't speak to my mother that way!"

"Well I'm through putting up with her-!"

"Would everyone just shut up!" Link unexpectedly shouted, surprising even himself but he could not take the sniping any longer. The entire table was now looking at him in shock, including Anju's grandmother, which was saying something because it was near impossible to get her attention. At the moment though, Link could care less. The growing anger that suddenly surged through him was still sizzling at the top. "For two weeks now, you've all done nothing but argue and snipe with each other and I'm sick of it!" The boy ended this spiel by tossing his barely touched plate of food to the side, splattering half the room with bits of stew and potatoes, and stalking outside.

"Well!" Anju's mother started, sounding thunderstruck and highly offended. "Never have I seen such a display of behavior."

Mutoh grunted in approval, looking just as outraged with his arms crossed over his chest. "He certainly needs to be taught a lesson. I'll straighten him out with my belt, I will," the man moved to get up from the table.

Anju reached over to grab his arm. "No Father! Maybe he has a point." the younger woman knew she needed to elaborate on this when this was received with confused looks. "If you don't count what just happened, I feel like Link's behavior since the quarantine started has been pretty good compared to the rest of us."

At hearing this, Mutoh bristled with indignation but didn't follow the boy. "He still should control his emotions in a civilized manner!" Anju's mother said shortly.

"I know… I will go and talk to him," Anju replied and left the table.

Link did not go far. Not that there was anywhere he could go. The village had people standing guard with weapons to make sure everyone abided by the quarantine rules. The boy knew that his outburst had gone too far this time. It wasn't often he lost control of his anger, and it was probably because of that it always turned out like a big spectacle when it did happen. He didn't have much practice on how to blow off steam in a civil way. Link highly doubted he would escape without some sort of punishment.

It wasn't long before the door opened, and the young hero turned to see Anju walking over to him looking grim. Link realized right then that he wasn't ready to be punished yet, he'd hoped that they would spend more time debating on how they would deal with his outburst. Maybe have a few arguments first. That didn't seem to be the case. Link did the only thing he could handle right now, and burst into tears. This only caused the child to feel even more stupid about himself, sometimes it was just so hard to be him and no one really understood it. Sure in size and stature he was only an eleven year old kid, but with all the time travel he's messed with, it felt like he had already relived the seven years he missed while sealed in the sacred realm. And that didn't even really happen. Goddesses! Thinking about his life always gave him a headache.

Anju's footsteps could be heard approaching him, and Link prepared himself to hear her start yelling at him. To his surprise however, instead of hearing shouts, he felt her wrap him in a warm embrace. The boy stiffened for a moment before melting into her comforting arms, reaching his own arms around her slim frame and crying into her chest. It had been a long time since he had been held like this, and Link never realized how starved he had been for this affection. Anju responded to his cries of despair with soft shushing words while rubbing gentle circles over his back, "Shh… shh, it's all right little one, it's all going to be ok. Shhh…"

It was quite some time before the boy's tears slowed down, and his sobs turned into the occasional hiccup. "I'm sorry Anju…" Link said in a highly crackled voice.

The woman responded with an almost amused sigh. "Now Link… I know things have been tough for us all lately, but don't you think throwing your food around was a little much?" Link's eyes cast downward in shame. She was absolutely correct; he had been way out of line and had no words to respond. After a couple moments of silence Anju said, "You know… we've been running low on food. What you think about going to the pond tomorrow all by yourself and catching a bunch of fish we could eat for supper?"

Link's face broke into a smile at hearing that suggestion. That sounded like the best idea ever, getting him off the farm for a bit, but not so far he'd run into trouble. He nodded enthusiastically. "Now how about we go back in and see if Nanna hasn't giving all the food away to the dog yet," Anju suggested with a sly smile. The boy responded with another nod and began walking towards the front door. "But you should probably apologize to my Mother and Father."

Since Anju's character in Ocarina of Time was just "The Cucco Lady" I gave her the only name that made sense. Which is her Majora's Mask name. I also gave her the same mother and grandmother from Majora's Mask.