This... is Berk. It's twelve days North of Hopeless, a few degrees South of Freezing To Death, and located solidly on the Meridian of Misery. It's also a great location for a restaurant, but Stoick's Place is on the brink of financial ruin.
VALKA: Well, my husband Stoick put this place on the map before we were even married. So, um... aye, we got betrothed, and when I was let off from my job as a history teacher, I needed to support the baby we had on the way, so... I became the assisstant to the Head Chef, which was Stoick...
"Right. Elsa..." Valka went into the kitchen, passing the new waitress that was sitting at the counter. "I'm going to take out that casserole, so can you just feed Cloudjumper while you're here?"
"Uh... yeah, sure thing, Val..." Elsa answered as Valka passed her the owl's bowl, which had a small pile of raw meat in it. Elsa was mildly put off by this, but kept a smile on her face as Valka left, taking it to where Cloudjumper's cage was.
"Who's a good birdie... huh?... who's a good boy..." she gently whispered as she turned up the latch. Cloudjumper poked his head from the opened cage door, staring down at the bowl that she had put down in front of it.
BEEDLE-EEP! BEEDLE-EEP! The phone on the desk suddenly rang, prompting Elsa to run back to grab it while leaving the owl unoccupied.
"Hello, thank you for calling Stoick's Place. How can I help you...?"
VALKA: When Stoick passed away, I naturally took control of the place, while our lad went on to become a restaurant-only accountant, ha ha... I've tried to keep it as much like his original vision as I could, really... am I a good chef? Well... aye... yes, I think I am...
"Argh! For Thor's sake!" Valka tensed her burnt hand back as the front component of the grill came undone, letting it clatter clumsily onto the floor as she stepped back from it. "Elsa! Elsa, the bloody grill's broken! I thought we just got this bastard thing fixed!"
HICCUP: My mom is a little... well... let's say easy to stress, and unless it was from my dad, she tends to hate being corrected or told that she's wrong... I, for one, have never ever lost an argument with her.
Having left his opened cage, Cloudjumper looked curiously at the camera that had been set up in front of the table, tapping it lightly with his beak before Elsa grabbed the back of his neck to pull him towards his bowl, putting down the phone she'd just finished talking in to.
"Elsa! Elsa!" Valka stormed out of the kitchen, with Elsa turning to face her long enough for Cloudjumper to clamp his beak onto her hand.
ELSA: Valka is a good person at heart, and I know she cares about us, and the restaurant, but... as someone with a history of emotional health issues, I can tell that she's not good at handling the problems that befall the restaurant. She obsesses over every single little problem, no matter how big, and it's actually the smaller issues that she can't let go... and this can make her very difficult to work with...
"Ugh! Son of a bitch, that hurt!" Elsa shrieked out as she grabbed her bitten hand while Valka put Cloudjumper back in his cage and shut it. Her breathing was already begin to get quicker and harder, before Elsa looked into the kitchen and screamed at the fire that was vomiting out of the broken grill.
ELSA: And I haven't told Hiccup this, but... but she's been having panic attacks... and they're pretty bad...
While Elsa grabbed the fire extinguisher to put out the blaze, she was unable to stop Valka from fainting as all her anxieties finally got to her, collapsing hard on the ground while Cloudjumper struggled frantically in his cage.
"Val? VAL!"
VALKA: I will admit that at my worst I can be... well... I can be a bit of a handful. But, when I need it, I'm not too proud to ask for help...
Coming up... Chef Hofferson arrives... at Stoick's Place...