#yeahhhh....

Warriors put a paper onto the bar beside Legend, a near glare aimed at him while the veteran hardly glanced up.

"What is this?" Warriors demanded.

"I'm a bit busy," Legend said, pulling a needle through fabric, tongue poking out the corner of his mouth.

Warriors shoved the paper in his face and forced him to redirect his attention.

"What is this?"

Legend met his eyes over the waved paper. "A wanted poster."

Warriors glared.

He rolled his eyes. "My wanted poster?"

"Why do you have a wanted poster?"

Legend sighed. "Because we haven't gotten around to taking them all down yet. I was framed and even then, Zelda pardoned me. It's not a big deal and nobody cares anymore."

A few days later, Legend found himself separated from the other heroes and unsurprisingly he was promptly cornered by guards.

He decided a long time ago not to fight his way out of these things, these men's minds were altered, they literally weren't themselves and... he'd already killed far too many technically innocent knights because of this damned irreversible spell.

So he complied, he'd escape overnight easily enough. He usually did, sometimes it was harder than usual for... various reasons.

The moment they relieved him of his items and supplies, he had a feeling it would be harder to escape than usual this time. He was full on thrown into the back wall of a cell, stars filling his vision and losing the air in his lungs. The following kick to his ribs further cemented that feeling as fact. Some guard stations were more violent than others... some beat him within an inch of his life. It made it hard to get up and keep going, but he had defeated Ganon when he was beaten down and within an inch of his life, he had cleared whole dungeons, he could escape a drunken guard station.

When they finally left, he couldn't bring himself to move for a while. It may have been an hour, he wasn't certain, but it took a while before he could force himself to move past the pain and broken bones and blood filling his lungs.

When he finally stood, he mentally amended his internal tracker of "how many days it had been since he had internal bleeding" from 17 weeks, aka since his last encounter with guards and getting caught, to 0. He covered his mouth with the back of his hand as blood bubbled up and tinted his skin further red and a bit of black.

Great, he thought blandly. This might not be a one potion fix, and he really didn't need to deal with--

"You lied to me. Not a big deal, vet? Nobody cares anymore?"

--the other heroes finding out. The one knight Legend wasn't expecting to see was Warriors, yet when he looked up and strained to focus his eyes, that's who stood on the other side of the bars.

"Geez, you look awful," he realized, frowning.

Legend glared, letting his vision unfocus and lessening the throbbing in his head. "No, really? Get away from the door."

"Why--I have the keys."

He snorted, ignoring the flash of pain as he slumped against the back wall. "Am I supposed to believe you paid bail?"

"Yes," Warriors said bluntly.

He let out a laugh that quickly descending into a painful, coughing fit that sprayed blood over his hand and the ground in front of him.

"Oh shit!" The door clicked unlocked and when he glanced up, hands were coming toward him. He couldn't help but flinch away.

Warriors froze.

Legend wheezed, wiping his face of blood and likely just smearing it. "Calling me a liar, Captain? They still arrest me even though the Queen pardoned me. Nobody could pay my bail. You..." he swallowed the bubbling blood. "You stole those keys."

Oh this wasn't good. He needed to move and get a potion, now.

He tried to stand.

"Whoa, hey don’t do that. Oh golden three, what did they do to you?" Warriors whispered, Legend still heard him even beyond the cotton in his head, his vision began to tunnel and his attempt to stand was shattered by his legs giving out. "Vet!"

The older hero caught him but not without jostling his ribs into stabbing his lungs further, sparking pain throughout his whole body. A pained cry escaped him.

"Oh goddess--Hey, it's going to be okay, just hold on a moment. I'll get you--"

The cell door suddenly slammed shut, a bark of laughter outside and Legend managed to try and focus enough to see a knight outside.

"Seems the criminal actually has friends, too bad that it's not enough to overcome a Knight of Hyrule," the man taunted.

Warriors snarled. "No knight would do this to anyone, convict or not."

"That brat kidnapped the princess and killed dozens of our men, he deserves any fate he's given so long as it hurts."

The guard left, despite Legend hearing Warriors yell after him.

He needed to move. He had the magic, he wasn't good at controlling it unfocused but he could explode the door if he just got up.

"Hey, hey it's okay. Just breathe, you’re going to be okay," Warriors promised him.

"I--" blood leaked from the edge of his mouth. "I-I can break the door. S-Stay behind me."

"Vet no! I'll figure something out, just save your strength!" Warriors pleaded, but as Legend fought to stand, he helped him.

Legend held a hand out to the door and a blast of pure magic exploded it off the hinges and broke the doorway too, it slammed into the far wall.

Blood trickled from his nose and his headache increased tenfold. Warriors caught him as he nearly collapsed.

"C-Cap'n... I don'..." he wheezed and choked. Oh goddesses he couldn't see anything anymore, just blurred blobs of color.

"No, hey, it's going to be alright. You're going to be perfectly fine, I swear. It's okay."

Warriors picked him up and he whined, his senses overwhelmed with pain and blinding him for a moment.

"Don't--Don't lie to me," he murmured. "I'm... I know what dying feels like."

It felt like acid in his veins, it felt like fire on his skin, it felt like water in his lungs and panic in his mind. Dying was painful and suffocating.

His throat filled with blood. His body stopped registering the pain.

His head dropped against Warriors chest, feeling the rapid beat of his heart but not hearing the begs to open his eyes.

"You lied to me," those were the first words Warriors spoke upon finding him in that cell.

Ha, Legend thought, a bit amused, you lied to me, actually...