The Both Of Us | Zelink X The Last Of Us

Chapter Twenty-One

Zelda's pov

A bump in the road wakes me up. The sun is just coming up, making the sky a mix of orange and gray. It's cold too. The heat wasn't going to last forever. I tug up the blanket and notice it's not a blanket at all. It's not my jacket either. I sit up with it around my shoulders and see Link glance back at me through the rear view mirror.

"You were cold last night," he says simply. He cared enough to cover me with his jacket.

I put my arms through the sleeves even though it's much too big for me. It's still nice. I lie down on my back and open my book. The knight was injured during a battle protecting his princess but it was her who ended up saving him. She couldn't bear to lose him.

As I read, I feel the dreadful beginnings of cramps. Periods were bad enough before the outbreak and now there's nothing for pain and even worse: no supplies. I have a couple tampons in my bag but once those are gone, I'll have to use the socks I keep to use as pads.

"Can we stop?" I ask. I'm not going to put a tampon in where he can see me and I have to use the bathroom anyway.

He pulls off and I'm glad he doesn't question why I need to stop. I hop out of the truck with my backpack. I guess I never got over my middle school embarrassment of taking out tampons in front of boys. His footsteps follow behind me as I make my way to the woods.

I turn around. "What are you doing?"

"Am I not allowed to piss?" I stare at him awkwardly. "I'm not a pervert," he adds almost like a joke and walks past me into the woods.

I squat behind a tree to relieve myself and I open a tampon. I should've searched Revali's house better for period products since he has no use for them. I insert the tampon and pull my pants back up. I get a stick to dig a hole to bury my garbage when I catch a glimpse of Link relieving himself by a tree several yards away. His back is to me but he turns his head to the side like he knows I'm looking at him.

"Who's the pervert now?" he calls over his shoulder. It was lighthearted though and I smile while I finish digging the little hole. It might be the end of the world but I don't want an innocent raccoon to eat my tampon applicator.

On the walk back to the truck, he pulls a switch knife from his belt and offers it to me. "You should be armed," he says.

I take it and flip the blade out. It's a long knife. And sharp. The group we ran into took the small knife I used to carry in the quarantine zone.

"Go for the neck." I pale at the thought of stabbing someone in the neck. "Some guys tank stab wounds too well if you don't land a fatal blow."

"You know from experience?" I smile, turning it into a joke to suppress my nerves. Kill or be killed I remind myself.

He lifts his shirt and points to a thin white line near his belly button.

"You've been stabbed?!" I've treated stab wounds and most end with extreme blood loss or infection. He's lucky to have survived it.

He nods and drops his shirt. "With a shiv. I've been shot too." He almost sounds...proud? I guess I'd be proud of myself too if I survived a stab wound and a gunshot.

"Where'd you get shot?"

He tugs down the collar of his shirt. There's a small circular scar that's slightly raised on his skin under his collarbone. "Here," he says and hesitates before he adds, "And in the ass."

I smile a little more. "How'd that happen?"

"Some bastard shot me before I jumped out a third story window. I didn't feel it until...until Impa pointed it out." The lighthearted tone of the conversation shifts after he mentions Impa. I know he misses her. I miss her and I only knew her for a couple days.

He sets his backpack down along with his two rifles and takes out a gun from the front pocket. I've never seen someone armed so heavily before. He must have at least ten knives on him at all times along with two pistols and his two rifles. His bag is full of ammo and more knives and guns I didn't know about.

"Pay attention," he says but he doesn't sound as stern as usual. He demonstrates how to take the magazine out and reload before he holds the gun out to me. "You do it."

I take the gun, the weight feeling familiar, and I reload like how he showed me.

"Good. Show me your grip again." I hold the gun out with my right hand on the handle and my left squeezing over it. He grabs the gun and tries to yank it from my grip. "Good," he says again when he's satisfied. "It goes in your backpack."

"You're giving it to me?"

"Like I said, you need to be armed." I slide my backpack off and put the gun in the front pocket. "Come here," he says when I zip the pocket. He picks up his rifle. "Take it away from me."

I frown. "What?"

He shakes the gun. "Take it away from me."

He says nothing when I take a step closer and reach out towards the rifle. There has to be a catch to this, some sort of lesson or he wouldn't be doing it. I grab the gun with both hands and pull. He breaks out of my grip easily and raises it like that man did before he hit me in the head. I flinch, my body expecting another blow to my head but he lowers the gun back to its resting position.

"You'll never win that way, especially if you hesitate. The person pointing the gun at you won't wait and you'll be dead before you get a chance to fight back." Kill or be killed has been drilled into my head since the first day with him and hesitation seems to be my worst enemy.

He holds the gun out to me and I keep my arms at my sides. I'm not falling for that again. The corner of his mouth lifts slightly. "I'm actually handing it to you this time."

I smile a little and take the gun, holding it like he does only mirrored. One moment he's standing in front of me and the next his arms are wrapped around the rifle and he drops to the ground. On the ground, he flips us over so he's on top of me and he has possession of the gun again. I shake from the small surge of adrenaline after his little demonstration.

"There." He fights off his smile again. I wish he wouldn't. "Element of surprise and how to get a gun." He raises the gun like before. "And then you can knock them out or shoot them." He stands and I sit up a little. Element of surprise he said.

As he's waiting for me to stand, I get up quickly, grabbing the gun like he did and I turn myself into dead weight. He falls with me and I use all my strength and the momentum to roll us over and pry the gun from his hands. He doesn't flinch or even blink when I raise the gun as if to hit him with it. Instead, he smiles and it's entirely different from when he smiled before he shot the sniper or when he went on his rampage in that base. It's genuine and I don't know why he hides it. It softens his entire face and for once he looks like a normal young man and not a battle hardened fighter. Under it all, he is just a man and this is the first time I've seen him behind all his walls.

"See?" he says, still smiling. "You just took down a two hundred pound man."

I smile back at him, proud of myself and grateful for his lessons. I'm not as helpless as I was when we first left. He's teaching me how to be a survivor.

Our smiles fade a little when our gaze lingers on each other longer than normal. His breathing changes slightly which I wouldn't have noticed had I not been sitting on his waist.

I awkwardly give him his gun and put both hands on his stomach to steady myself as I stand. He feels as strong as he looks. His Adam's apple bobs slightly when he swallows and he stands up too.

"We should get going." Back to his usual straight face but now I know there's more underneath. There's more to him that he's too scared to show. Or maybe he's too scared to lose.