She counted the days in terror since the July calendar had been posted on the Duty Board. On July 28th, it would be her turn for mess duty. As the day drew closer, her pink hair gradually frayed at the ends due to stress, her diligently cared-for maid uniform suffered more and more wrinkles, and according to Jakob, her tea's been getting lukewarm. Finally, the fateful morning came, and Felicia met the rising sun with a heavy air of conviction, ready to prepare the best breakfast ever prepared for Corrin's army.

Inside, she was greeted by the familiar eating tables and kitchen of their modest mess hall. It was a modestly furnished affair with rich, finished wood counters, pots, pans, a wood stove, and all the sharp, dangerous cutlery she'd ever need. Felicia searched the walls until she found a small clipboard with every recipe for every kind of palette in the army - all she had to do was choose one and make enough to feed everyone for the morning.

With a trembling hand, Felicia followed the name of the dish with her forefinger as she read: a Hoshidan comfort food called 'okonomiyaki.' Following the list of ingredients and the recipie's directions, she deduced that it was a sort of pancake. Her confidence surged. She's burned crepes before, even made one once. What could go wrong?

As Felicia rummaged through the icebox for eggs, she remembered the last time she cooked for the army. While her blueberry muffins weren't as dangerous as Rinkah's food, they turned horrendously mushy because she knocked the entire basket of blueberries into the batter. While her food was much less dangerous than Rinkah's cooking, many poor soldiers were left with blue stains on their armor to clean. Oboro got so upset she nearly destroyed a training dummy. Oh, the embarrassment...

Shifting back to the icebox, Felicia noticed no evidence of a midnight snack raid by Keaton, the wolfskin eating machine. All the eggs were accounted for, as were the various vegetables she'd need, all except for the all important daikon. With the rest of her ingredients stacked on the main counter, she struggled to remember where to find the daikon.

Just in the nick of time, Setsuna walked in with the grace of a deer stuck in a beartrap. She pulled her teal blue hair out of her eye with one hand while holding a bundle of daikon in the other as she walked to the counter. They locked eyes, Setsuna's a little vacant, Felicia's a little startled. While it was obvious to Felicia that Setsuna was spacing out again, she greeted her anyways. "Good morning, Setsuna!"

"Good morning, Felicia" Setsuna replied. "Lord Hinoka asked me to help you out, so I harvested some daikon from the field." She looked at her bundle as if to confirm for herself that it was, in fact, the hardy white vegetable instead of something else. "Yup, that's daikon" she added bluntly.

"Thank you so much!" Felicia exclaimed graciously. "I'll make you the best oku...oko...yi...pancakes ever!"

"Okonomiyaki." Setsuna interjected without a hint of emotion.

"Oh." Felicia chided herself silently. "Sorry. Ok-ko-no-mi-ya-ki. Does that sound right?"

"Yup." Setsuna said while removing her archers gloves and snaking her way behind the counter. "You take to our language pretty well for a Nohrian. Shall I help you cook? Or can I go back to bed now?"

Felicia rushed over and held Setsuna's hands in excitement. "Oh would you stay? I don't want to mess this up, and I could really use your guidance. Please!"

Setsuna resigned herself to it. Her greatest weakness was a well laid trap, and Felicia caught her. Fortunately, she was feeling extra detached that morning. "Sure."

Soon, they fired up the woodstove, chopped vegetables, beaten eggs, and made themselves a batter. Felicia poured it onto the oiled pan with a smile of practiced ease. Setsuna looked on with critiquing eyes, reminding Felicia that there's no right way to flip okonomiyaki, that yes, it really does take that long under the lid for it to cook, and that they were running out of time.

"At least we didn't crack the countertop again" Setsuna noticed.

And at last, it was done. Before them lay one steaming, savory circle of doughy golden brown, speckled with green onion, cabbage, and seaweed. Setsuna added some sauce out of a ladle from another large pot on the stove. The pair took a bite to taste, Felicia with her fork, Setsuna with her chopsticks.

"It's perfect." Setsuna flatly remarked while chewing.

Felicia could only swoon in agreement, unable to find words to describe the excitement of tasting something new and amazing. She was so enamoured with the flavor that she hopped around the kitchen with glee until, upon returning to Setsuna's side, noticed the oven had gone cold. She bent down to examine the charred remains of the fire. "Um...what happened to our fire?"

"Frozen." Setsuna informed her through chattering teeth. "Everything's frozen."

A trail of frost and ice marked her path around the place. Powdery snow drifted slowly into neat piles where her footsteps were, and everything below the waist twinkled with a layer of slick, smooth ice. Perfect for skating, Felicia thought to herself, not for walking.

"You've turned the whole place into a death trap." Setsuna chuckled, having been trapped twice in one morning. Outside the window, she saw Oboro and Beruka on their way back from training. Felicia came to look also, and her breath caught short.

In the deepest recesses of Felicia's brain, dark thoughts simmered on a pan. 'The okonomiyaki was delicious,' she thought, 'but the kitchen's frozen over, with poor Setsuna caught in the mix!' While the room around her chilled, (Setsuna noticed Felicia's feet becoming engulfed in a thin layer of ice) negative thoughts struck her over and over like lightning. 'I'm always clumsy, never adequate, and because of it everyone will starve! Jakob will kill me, and we'll surely lose the coming battle. Does this mean...'

"Do you always think out loud?." Setsuna said, slumped over the kitchen counter. The morning light illuminated her stoic, almost disinterested gaze. "Some ice-cream will cheer you up." She pulled out a bag of salt from a cabinet beneath her. "It'll take a few minutes to make, but…"

Felicia was already softly crying into her shoulder. "No, no. Let's make some. Lots, actually."

Lord Takumi, his retainer Oboro, and a less-than-grumpy Belka sat together at the mess table with mounds of ice-cream between them. "It's not okonomiyaki," Takumi said while leaning back in his chair, "but it's not bear meat either. Try the strawberry flavor, Oboro."

Oboro replied with a huff, shoving a spoonful in her mouth. The softly sweet flavor turned her resting death glare into a mere furrow on her brow. "This tastes like a stomach ache waiting to happen. Is ice-cream for breakfast a Nohrian thing?"

"No" Belka informed them while eating her green tea flavored breakfast. "Eating ice-cream outside of dessert is unusual even for the Ice Tribe." Her sharp eyes cut into Oboro like the glare from an unsheathed knife. "Is there a problem here?"

The two of them shook their heads and dug into their cold breakfast. Across the way, Jakob scrutinized his small bowl of the stuff, picking at it with his spoon. "Not good." Jakob said to himself. "Not bad, either. It was a mistake to put her in the kitchen again."

Flora pulled her blue hair back to . "I disagree. This time, she didn't have to stitch her partner's finger back on."

"True. Your sister deserves some praise." Jakob declared. "Though she will have to thaw the place before lunch."

Meanwhile, the fiery Lord Hinoka snuck up to the counter and called Felicia and her retainer Setsuna up for a talk. She put her hands on her hips and smiled, addressing her shivering archer. "Where's my okonomiyaki, Setsuna?"

"Um...sorry" Setsuna said, barely able to make eye contact through her bangs. "We made one and ate it to taste. And then...well…" She gestured toward the still-frozen kitchen behind her.

Hinoka sighed and chuckled. "So your first idea was to make ice-cream?"

"It was our only idea, really." Felicia said to the floor. She bowed piteously. "I'm very sorry! Please don't blame Setsuna!"

One couldn't tell if Hinoka was touched or annoyed by her sour smile, but actions spoke louder. She reached over the counter and patted Felicia's head. "Everything's fine. While someone's diet is surely ruined, what's important is that you didn't give up. And that's what makes you a warrior. Both of you. Carry on!"

Felicia and Setsuna saluted her and helped themselves to more ice-cream, watching the red-haired pegasus flier rejoin her friends at a distant table. Still, the frying pan in Felicia's head baked more dark thoughts to chew on. "Your lady Hinoka is so nice" she said, quietly crying and eating at the same time.

"She is" Setsuna said with her mouth full. "Even if I wasn't her retainer, I'd die for her. Almost did a couple times, in fact."

"Just like me and Lady Corrin!" Felicia gleamed, her worries buried under sweets and friendship. "Tell me all about it!"

The end of breakfast was drawing to a close. Felicia lost track of time as Setsuna shared her stories over ice-cream. It'd been so long since she met someone so accident prone as her, and their conversation marched on steadily until it was time for their next battle.