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A small jar fell out of the cupboard and to the ground, knocked by Hyrule’s hurried hands. He barely paused a moment to look at it—made out of reinforced glass, it didn't break, but it wasn't something he needed, so he left it for now. Usually he was more careful than that.
But this wasn't, by any stretch of the imagination, a usual situation. Hyrule’s wrists and shoulders ached, a consequence of being cuffed in a broken-down building for a few hours. As the person with the bag marked by the yellow fairy, even these Black-Blooded, out of the loop as they were, left him mostly alone. If they'd had any updated information, they likely would've drugged him right away. They didn't, making Hyrule wonder how official that cell of criminals really was. He worked through the minor pain.
He twisted off the lid of a different jar and crouched down as he poured some of the blue liquid into a short graduated cylinder, marked with measurements on the side, so he stayed eye-level with the meniscus. This wasn't a particularly fiddly antidote, but this part did require good measurements. It needed just the right consistency.
He checked his measurement on a scale, then poured the blue into a bowl, wetting down some of the powders he'd already measured out. The stirring rod got to work mixing it all together.
Hyrule let out a half-relieved breath. He ran a hand down his face and leaned up against the counter. He was grateful that he hadn't been injured to the point of bleeding during that debacle—very grateful—but his safety had come at a cost. Warriors had paid it, knowing exactly what he was doing and what he was protecting, and if Hyrule wasn't quick…
Looking back, Hyrule could say confidently that Warriors had been serving as a distraction on purpose. He'd made noise, drew attention, and his struggles had only been met with frustration and… And eventually, the thing that killed him.
Or appeared to.
“Updates?” The captain’s voice came from a panel on the wall, since Hyrule hadn't even bothered taking the time to put in an earpiece.
Hyrule checked on his solution. “I added the dyed saline. Once it's all mixed, I'll package it and bring it over. Has he woken up?”
“He hasn't so much as stirred.” Time clicked his tongue, disguising his worry. “His heartbeat is all but nonexistent, and his skin is cool.”
I'm worried, he didn't say.
Hyrule nodded anyway, eyes trained on the glass bowl as he prepared a liner in a bottle for the finished antidote. “He'll be all right.” He wished he believed that as firmly as he said it.
“I know.”
Digital silence passed between them.
And then the stirring rod went quiet, and Hyrule transferred the thick, pasty solution into the lined bottle with a spatula. He knocked another tool or other off the counter as he packed up to leave his medbay, but he could always clean up later. He snatched a few plastic gloves and shoved them into his pocket.
“On my way. Open the door?”
“Of course. Twilight…” The sound went quiet.
Warriors mattered now.
Hyrule would have been quiet even without the gag, afraid of someone recognizing him as more than just a companion with a healer’s kit. He huddled in the corner, working on twisting his chafing wrists out of the cuffs that held them tight behind his back. He watched Warriors rise to his knees once again, defiance painted on the lines of his face.
Almost bored, one of the guards watching them flicked a button on his remote, and Hyrule saw sparks fly from Warriors’s own restraints. That got him to breathe quietly for a few more seconds.
“You have to realize by now that it's less than futile,” the guard said.
But Warriors laughed, low and amused. He got up again and went for the guard’s feet.
Another zap, another fall to bruised knees. Hyrule flinched and wished that Warriors would stop for a moment, they'd be all right…
“I'm tired of this,” the other guard said, and when Warriors stood back up, wavering and unsteady, they lunged forward with something glinting and sharp in their hand.
The effect was immediate: Warriors’s eyes rolled back, his skin turned pale, and he fell even more limply than before. A red pattern bloomed across his skin in a sign that had Hyrule's heart dropping hard.
Hyrule screamed behind the gag, muffled but no less impassioned. Warriors would be dead within hours, if no antidote was administered. He doubted these people would even have it.
It was his scream that led the others to the right room.
Hyrule held the antidote in both hands as he rushed through the Epona. The door to Warriors's room was slid open already, only Twilight outside to shoo anyone else away. Everyone cared about Warriors, but the room could only hold so many people, and he could be strict about… who was around him while he was vulnerable. Hyrule certainly couldn't blame him for that.
As was standard for all of them when they were hurt, someone had attached a bracelet to Warriors’s wrist, and several vital signs flashed red on the screen above his bed. Hyrule would be a lot more worried, ironically, if he couldn't see those red patterns, almost roselike in shape, spreading from the point of injection on Warriors’s neck outward. Only about half his face was colored, though Hyrule suspected the patterns dipped far below his collar. The pale skin and bruised eyes beneath did nothing to help him look any more alive.
Time stood from a chair as Hyrule entered the room, and Twilight closed the door behind himself.
“Does he need to drink it?” Time asked, moving to lift him up.
“It's more like a lotion,” Hyrule said. He set the bottle down and pulled out the liner so the paste inside was accessible. “Anywhere there's red. The poison mostly sits in the dermis of a Hylian, so skin absorption will be faster than intravenous. He’ll likely break out, but he'll be alive.”
Twilight helped to remove Warriors’s boots, then started on the rest of his clothes for easy access. “I guess we can listen to him complain about a few zits if we have to.”
Hyrule smiled thinly and switched places with Time to card his fingers through Warriors’s golden hair, looking at how far the poison had spread on his scalp. He hated this stuff, but at least it made itself obvious. He pulled a pair of gloves from his pocket and pushed them on carefully over his fingers, knowing that it would take seconds longer if he ripped one.
“Can we help?” Twilight asked, pushing aside the last of the fabric so Hyrule could see every last inch of affected skin. The red patterns spread down Warriors’s whole left side, inching toward his heart.
“Help me turn him over when I need it. Your claws will rip through my gloves and this stuff will really irritate your skin. Try not to touch it.”
“Will do.”
Hyrule scooped up a bit of the bluish paste, then started the work of applying it in gentle circles, starting about where the poison had first gone in and working outward. Time and Twilight helped to rearrange Warriors where necessary, and because they worked well together, the whole process only took a few minutes. They felt like an eternity.
But as Hyrule removed his gloves and tossed them into the trash, the screen already showed a marked improvement in every one of Warriors’s problems: his heartbeat had picked up, as had his temperature and skin conductivity. Something in Hyrule’s shoulders loosened, and he picked up Warriors’s unaffected arm to double-check that the bracelet was clasped correctly and wasn't lying about the upward trend.
It wasn't.
“He'll be okay,” Hyrule finally said, holding Warriors’s hand in both his own. His voice dropped, and he addressed his friend directly. “Idiot. Thank you.”