Not So Obedient
Disclaimer: I don't own TP, though if I did it definitely would have ended differently. (Midna/Link, whoo!)
Pain.
That was the first feeling he experienced upon awareness, the inexplicable and unbearable sensation of not being completely whole. The edges of his vision were pitch black as the Twilight through which he had stumbled, once, at a time that he could not manage to recall. The rest was hazy, a patched up quilt of blurs and moving things, shadowy and as indiscernible as the bottom of a murky pond. It felt like he was in that pond; something liquid but not quite wet leaked around his arms and head, seeping through the material of his ripped tunic and clinging to his skin. It was almost nonexistent, that feeling, and it took him more than a few moments to realize that it was blood.
His blood.
The fingers that almost seemed to be a part of someone else twitched, and it brought him no agony. Then his arm, which gave no sign of injury. Confused, he began to move his shoulder, certain now that the blood wasn't, in fact, his, but the life fluid of another to whom this distorted world belonged.
And he screamed. There was a sudden flurry of movement and a shady blur hovered over him, something soft being pressed gingerly but firmly to the gash that flowed crimson near his neck. It was silent, for a moment, and in that moment the pain began to slowly recede. He could feel himself being pulled back into the abyss, drifting towards it like the line of a fishing pole being brought to bear. A choked, whispered plea reached his acute ears.
"Please don't die." His fingers twitched again, almost as if in response to the foreign prayer, and a gasp announced the sudden and forceful removal of that thing pressed against his shoulder.
A moment of quiet, and then, sounding almost frightened… "Link?"
Ah, so that was his name. He had almost forgotten, in the cloud that fogged his mind. And with that answer came a question.
"Where…are…we?" A wheezing cough shook his lungs in a vice grip, shaking his already decimated body to the core.
"We're outside the Arbiter's Grounds." Another moment of quiet. "Do you remember anything?"
Was that Midna? It had to be. No one else would be out in the desert with him. The imp's small, dark body floated nearby, and if he struggled he could just make out the bizarre but fascinating color of her eyes.
"No." Another winded cough, and before he could breathe something was pressed to his cracked lips. He choked and struggled, some instinct welling up inside him to resist, before a none-too-gentle rap of tiny knuckles atop his head ceased his fighting. Midna made an audible sound of satisfaction as he drank.
"Good, you can still talk." And that thing was pressed to his shoulder again. Link could feel the soft contours of a slightly coarse material rubbing against his skin. He winced.
"What…is that?"
"A piece of your tunic. Now shut up, and concentrate on breathing. I can't have you dying on me, not yet."
Link couldn't help but smile, despite the morbidity of that statement. Midna would be Midna.
"Why are we…out here?"
He couldn't make out her form clearly, but she gave a distinguished pause in her movements before resuming her chore. "A ReDead." She declared obliquely. "It nearly beat you to death. I couldn't get it off you before it took a bite out of your shoulder. I warped us out here."
Link shuddered. He hated those foul things, and he was suddenly absurdly grateful he couldn't remember anything.
Midna abruptly gave a great outcry of frustration, throwing the torn piece of green cloth aside. "This is hopeless," she growled, white entering his vision as she pulled her lips back menacingly to show her wickedly sharp teeth gleaming in the new moonlight. Her glare was solely for the wound that was the cause of her recent troubles. "I'm taking you to Kakariko. That shaman can do a better job than I can." His vision was filled with black and pale as she rose up into the air, preparing to warp the both of them to the dusty village all the way across Hyrule. Link experienced a moment of sheer panic and lunged for her tiny arm, ignoring the screaming agony in his shoulder with a solid determination.
"No!"
"No? What do you mean, 'no'? You can't tell me what to do! I'm taking you to Kakariko!"
"You can't—" His tirade was cut short as another hacking fit seized him, and she hastily flew to his side, hanging hopelessly as she examined the wound that was oozing a continuous flow of blood.
"It's useless," she said desolately, sluggishly falling out of the air until she came to rest by his side. "It's infected." Without warning she exploded angrily. "That damn ReDead! You're going to die out here, you brainless idiot; I have to take you to Kakariko. Don't tell me it's infected your brain too, or else we'll really be screwed!"
He shook his head, reaching up with his good hand to poke at the edge of the bite tenderly. "You can't," he said, stopping for a moment to cough briefly. His vision was starting to dance, and he saw growing black spots that certainly weren't Midna. "You'll be seen, and they'll probably mob you. I won't take that chance."
Midna looked as if she was going to argue, but with a unexpectedness that surprised him she seemed to deflate, her head falling forward until her 'crown' was touching the sand. She sounded tearful.
"You stupid human. I guess you all aren't so obedient after all."
A/N: (Edited) No longer a one-shot.