Tell Me a Story
…
"Dad," Zephyr says quietly as he scrambles around to clean up the room the heiress of Berk currently owns. It seems like it wasn't only his brains that she inherited but also the kind of room that looks extremely clean but messy at the same time. At first glance, all you can see are the drawing of dragons on parchment on the wall but if you look at the room in more detail, it's just a small cluster here and there. He doesn't mind though, he will continue cleaning for the moment for the young heiress.
"Yes, Zephyr?" He asks quietly, putting the plushies that his mother made for his two kids in the basket where they will certainly get used the next day.
"Can you tell me a bedtime story?" She asks quietly and he stops, looking back towards her. This is the first time she's ever asked such a thing and he's not too sure about what to say. He never asked his dad for a bedtime story when he was a kid so there was nothing that he could say to her.
"Sure." He says with no hesitation as he turns back to just clean up the rest of the toys. "What kind of story do you want?"
"Something with you and mommy!" She says excitedly. "But it has to be fake! I want to see your imagination!" Don't let the voice fool you though, he knows that she's tired but she's always excited for things that strike her as interesting. He guesses that his storytelling is one of those things.
"Something with mommy and me…" He drawls off, almost wanting to wrack his brain to think of a cool story that happened to him and Astrid. Instead, though, he gets a different idea, a what-if idea.
"Alright," he says, "how about Marriage?"
…
…
She makes it to the rock entrance, gasping slightly and realizing that she's going to face up against a Night Fury and she curses herself on being foolish as to not bring anyone else. She doesn't have much time to think about that though as she goes through the rock entrance, gripping her axe handle as if her life depends on it and it will.
She sees the scene, seeing the Night Fury looking directly at her, its wings raised to give the image of being larger and she gulped. The moon's finally rising and she tries to glance at and around the beast to find Hiccup. She narrows her eyes, the beasts' eyes turning full-on green she could barely see the slit.
She treks down the rocks, having to take her eyes off the dragon as she sees the arch that enters the cove. She slowly crosses over the archway, her eyes immediately going towards the dragon as it's still in its same position. This time though, only a couple of paces and she can touch that beast.
Nevertheless, she tries looking around the cove searching for auburn hair or a small silhouette, something that would indicate that he's there and not completely gone, burned. Except, except. Except Hiccup isn't here anymore, unless that beast is hiding him which wouldn't make any sense. Without anything happening, she finally looks at the culprit, the murder. That dragon just killed the heir of Berk and she will not let that beast roam free. Regardless of the relationship, she had with the heir, that, that beast just killed the heir of Berk. She will not let this beast go without any consequences.
"You will pay beast." She whispers to him and he growls in response, barring its white teeth towards her as it extends his wings even higher. She raises her axe, waiting to start the battle to avenge Hiccup.
"Wait." She hears a small voice behind the dragon making her freeze. "Tooth—" the nasal voice coughs, "Toothless. Don't… Don't kill her. That's my betrothed." The dragon seems to have ignored him and opens his mouth. She looks to her left and sees open grass, seeing that the moment the dragon shot, she's going to dive towards the open grass. Before the dragon shot, it abruptly closes its mouth and collapses, closing its eyes as it grumbles out the smoke that was going to be used for her. She blinks, slowly lowering her axe but keeping high guard against the beast.
She sees Hiccup to the left of the dragon as he slowly starts to get up only to have his knees buckle and him falling, "ow."
"Hiccup," she whispers yells at him, "are you alright?" He seems to be completely unresponsive towards her as he glances towards the dragon. He tries to get up again and successfully makes it to his feet as he walked towards the beast, ignoring her completely.
"Toothless?" He falls on his knees again and she stays still, grabbing her axe in case of a worst-case scenario as she slowly starts to take a few paces away from the pack. She stops suddenly as the dragon's eyes open towards Hiccup, the pupils being more round than slits and growling softly at him. Hiccup hugs the head and she recoils in disgust, did he just witnessed what was about to transpire?
"Traitor." She says too loud as he winces, hearing her. He gets up, his hair covering his eyes as she could only see his back as he turns around.
"T-thank you." He finally says his first words towards her and it sounds fake. She would've said something except the beast growls as if wanting Hiccup to pay attention to it. He does so willingly. She grabs her axe but the dragon didn't care about her, only glancing her slightly as it growls softly at him to get Hiccup's attention for the second time.
"What is it Toothless?" He murmurs, putting his hands between its eyes. The dragon shrugs his hand off its face and looks towards the sky. She hesitates to take her eyes off the beast but Hiccup does it easily, looking towards the sky and the moon. She starts to shiver and she sees Hiccup slightly moving back and forth as if to warm up his limbs. He turns towards her with a face of shock.
"A raid is coming."
And she couldn't believe the absurdity of that statement as she throws her axe into the ground, crossing her arms and glaring daggers at the idiotic heir that could've died and him just not acknowledging it. She thought that he died and he does something stupid and says something stupid like 'a raid is coming' with no concern of what her not seeing him did to her! Why does she feel so moved! He's a traitor anyways! Now that it's evident that he doesn't care that she found out his secret, she's trying to see how to convince him that trusting that dragon is suicidal and just why is everything so complicated with the heir of Berk!?
"We need to talk"
…
…
He winces, his brain just processing the fact that she now knows.
"Later Astrid?" He tries pleading, raising his palms towards her as he takes a step in front of Toothless to protect him from her. He prays to the gods – mostly Loki because he feels like Loki is treating him like a puppet – that Astrid couldn't see his knees shaking uncontrollably either because of the cold or just what has transpired between Toothless and himself.
"No, Hiccup." She maintains her stance, "here and now." He wants to bitterly laugh at this situation that would've never transpired if he didn't lash out at her during the one-sided argument at the forge. He moves his head to find Toothless now having his rapt attention to his betrothed, his stance slowly changing into a more aggressive form. He sighs, putting a hand behind him to make Toothless calm himself slightly, although he doesn't know what Toothless will do considering the fact earlier on he couldn't have stopped Toothless from shooting.
"What do you want," he gulps, realizing just how much of a mess this has become with the one person he'd thought wouldn't follow him, "to know?" He feels the heat of Toothless just barely by the edges of his hand. Even though they quickly apologized to each other, he still has a fear that he won't control Toothless if he has another… accident. He turns his head towards the place where he thought it was going to be his last moments alive.
He shudders as he saw the scorched mark to the right of his head the moment he had the guts to open his eyes.
"What was that blast?" She shoots the first question and he glances behind him to find Toothless still in his aggressive stance but not doing anything, having all of his attention on Astrid as if she does anything suspicious he'll pounce. In the corner of his eyes does he see his tailfin methodically move back and forth, creating a rhythm that shows the brown tailfin. He sighs, how does he respond to that question without sounding that he had no control over Toothless?
"He was possessed?" He replies hesitantly, hating how his voice cracked midway through as he directs his head to find her eyes. "I believe that whatever is causing the raid is possessing the dragons."
"Uh-huh," she crosses her arms, not believing whatever he's saying. "So just any dragon is just nice people then?" He stays quiet as he thinks that Astrid was going to ramble and then silence came. There's an awkward staring contest between him and her and Toothless grunts at him, probably telling him that he can go and try to fight her and he moves his eyes to find Toothless completely in rapt with the blond shieldmaiden and realized that Toothless, at this very moment, is currently stable and not up to any shenanigans. He still keeps his right hand closeby to Toothless' face, hoping that it would be enough to stop him from pouncing on his betrothed.
"Hiccup!" She yells at him and he jumps, "focus! How is it that you care more about that…" He sees Astrid struggling to find words as she gesticulates towards the general direction of Toothless and he glances over to find Toothless being still, slowly baring his teeth at what he assumes to be an insult. "Why do you care that more than the people in your village? The ones you're supposed to lead?"
"He's my friend." He quickly responds and that didn't seem to be the right answer as she physically went redder. He unconsciously takes a step backward.
"He? That thing is a beast Hiccup. You're not gaining anything from it." She crosses her arms as if he had no defence.
"I disagree," he responds right at her, "he's the only a living thing that's been trying to gain my friendship and has successfully done so."
"Why though?" She says to him as she begins to rub her arms and he can see that he's not convincing her in the slightest, making it seem like she could run away and he sighs, looking at his best friend to inspire him. All he saw was him glaring with suspicion at his betrothed, something that isn't giving him that much confidence. Gods, it's cold as he unconsciously shifts weight from one leg to another.
He stays quiet, keeping his eyes on the dragon that just shot point-blank at him and survived. "He was tied up." He starts, and Toothless turns and tilts his head, the earflaps making Toothless look funny and he smiles, gaining some slight confidence. "I knew what I had to do. Grab the dagger," he finally moves his arms from a surrendering form to him visually grabbing the dagger with both of his hands and stares at his hands grabbing an imaginary dagger towards Toothless. He remembered how small the dagger was compared to the Night Fury that was bounded, mixed with both black scales and brown rope.
"Stab him, and then drag his body in full pride to my father." He looks up to find the same eyes that paralyzed him the first time they met. A bright electrical yellow-green pair staring right at him "I… I couldn't do it, Astrid." He feels himself shivering, whether it was the past he was telling or the present cold that he's experiencing, he doesn't know. He turns his head to the left to find her skeptical with an eyebrow raised.
"Out of all the people who needed this kill, who needed his head framed right on top of the fireplace," he raises his voice at his betrothed as he shifts his whole body to face her as he extends his right arm to point right at Toothless. "I needed this the most, Astrid! The most!" He raises his voice, telling himself to keep eye contact with his betrothed.
Then the eye-contact got to him, the fear in Toothless' eyes, the resignation in the whole body language and he cringes right in front of her, remembering how limp he was and he wouldn't be surprised if the Night Fury died right in front of his eyes. He shakes his head.
"I couldn't do it, Astrid." He concludes as he unknowingly got close to her. If he extended both his arms he could touch the shoulder pad that was Astrid. He takes a step back, "I was killing a sentient being. A terrified animal that just saw his life flash before his eyes and I didn't have the guts to do it, Astrid." He mutters, looking back towards his best friend as Toothless went back to looking at Astrid to see if she had done any suspicious movement.
"I saw his eyes," He says. He remembered the scene so clearly, just how defeated Toothless was when he raised the small dagger he created. His eyes showed the fear that replicated the fear he had although for an entirely different reason. Toothless' eyes were mirrors that saw him holding the dagger, arms visibly shaking and he saw himself almost killing a dragon.
"I couldn't do it." He whispers. It sounds like he's going around in circles and maybe he does stink at explaining but he hasn't gone back to that situation that happened eons ago. He turns his body to find Toothless softly growling at him as if telling him to stop feeling guilty. "So I didn't." His vision was starting to blur, the crisp vision he had was just colours mixed and he blinks multiple times to try to clear his vision. He wipes his eyes, emotions flying high for him as he doesn't hear nor see what Astrid is doing, much less think about him or what he has for a secret. Will she rat him out for doing the right thing in her eyes? It is the right thing for Berk, they wouldn't want him anyways and they always showed their disproval openly. He tries to calm down and somewhat succeeds until something from the back of his head told him something that made him look right at her.
'She already knew'
Something that he hadn't questioned clicked immediately as he realizes that usually, Astrid is much more vocal and much more aggressive with unknown things and right now she's isn't herself as he keeps staring, making her uncomfortable but her stoic expression giving nothing away as he can hear the silence brewing, the cold air attacking right back at them as he looks at his betrothed with more detail. A cold face, the same crossed arms like the one at the forge, that regular blue shirt and skirt that she usually wears and the axe to her left embedded in the grass. He sighs, his relationship with Astrid seems to just keep getting complicated and with two conflicting points of view on something that lives and breathes and he just wishes he could reset this day and try again. He vividly remembers what she asked him, forced him to do with the first conversation at the forge and he mentally prepares himself for this proposition.
"All I ask is one favour from you Astrid." He says, his resolution getting stronger over time as he finds her rubbing her arms to get rid of the cold as she holds a blank visage to the scene in front of her. He opens his arms, "give me time to go away from here. Let me just build his tailfin," he 'psst' at Toothless and he turns his head, a rare moment of him not staring daggers at Astrid as he points to his tailfin. Toothless growls at him, a negative response to that and he wanted to facepalm at the fact that he's about to show Astrid Hofferson - the prime role model of the Vikings - Toothless' weakness and he coughs, trying to forget that mistake. "Um," he tries to restart as he looks back at her, her raised eyebrow not helping him regain his confidence. "Let me complete it, perfect it so that I can go away." Her face doesn't move a muscle, anything from her brain visibly showing as he gulped. "I know you don't want to keep this a secret but please, for me Astrid," he pushes his fingers into his chest, his voice unwillingly breaking for the umpteenth time, "so that I don't have to return here. I know you hate me, I know you didn't and still don't want any of this broken mess that I have created here but everything will be back to normal the moment I leave." The distance between them seems to have shortened figuratively but yet not muscle moved from the blond shieldmaiden.
"I promise you."
A silent pause happened for her to process her options.
He stays extremely quiet as he feels that his future is going to lie in her hands. Funny enough, her future was going to lie in both of their hands but how times change and how times change fast.
Her visage finally begins to break down as her muscles were starting to twitch, her stoic face finally breaking down as she releases a sigh. She proceeded to open their mouth, to give him the answer that will determine his fate for the rest of his life whether or not he'll be free from the chains of following what's right and what's wrong, something that seemed so black and white turned gray and blurred for him.
Some stupid dragon roars in the distance cut her off before she even spoke a word and he turns towards the sky, Toothless in his peripheral vision. He sees how Toothless begins to growl again, his eyes turning to slits, the same type of expression when he entered the cove. Without thinking, he grabs her arm and the axe in the other hand and proceeds to run away from him. Something is interesting about the fact that Toothless seems to… Well, lose control. As if something is possessing him.
He'd have to think and ponder on that later.
"Let's get out of here." He says as they proceeded to climb out of the cove.
And into the raid that's about to-"
"That story blows," Zephyr says innocently as he stops midway, looking towards her in a slight shock. Although it wasn't the best storytelling he could do on the fly, he thought it was at least decent.
"Oh," he says with little gusto. "What kind of story do you want then?" He asks her for a second time, not too sure what to say. Zephyr seems to be thinking about what kind of story she wants.
"What about your bond with Toothless?"
He smiles at that, thinking of another fiction story that could relate to his bond with Toothless.
"Alright," he says softly, looking at her to see her having big wide eyes. "How about Secretive?"
…
…
The dragons have settled nicely around the cove. Course, there were too many dragons that the beautiful cove can handle so most of the dragons have diverted towards near sea stacks and miniature islands scattered around Berq. He was alone at the moment, two days into dropping Hiccup at Berk and he was just pacing around the cove. He just ordered the rest of the dragons to go out and play, relax for a bit until there's news somewhere. He was surprised at the amount of loyalty given to him by the dragons, everyone asking him for some advice or to go help with some dispute. It seems like he was their King many moons ago and not two days ago. He looks around, not knowing what to do to pass the time. Usually, he'd go with a flight with Hiccup but because his tail fin doesn't work without Hiccup, he's grounded.
He suddenly hears a small roar of an Inflamer, the roar attracting a couple of dragons nearby the cove to land near him. The Inflamer arrives, the dragon bigger than himself with talons at the end of the wings and the horns being a prominent feature. This Inflamer was different though, it wasn't part of the pack. The Inflamer prominent features are the fact that she's blue and yellow, something usual with the Inflamers, in general, being extremely colourful. He just nods at her, knowing that she was here for a reason. The Inflamer exaggeratedly bows down to him.
"Congratulations on becoming King." She hisses at him, though she's just growling towards the ground, making the dragons at the cove growl at her. Toothless raises his tail fin for silence as he waits for the Inflamer to say something else. When she raises her head, he saw how there were spots of red around the wings and her body. He sees just how much her body posture screams of her not wanting to be here.
"Viggo has acknowledged the fact that Hiccup did defeat the Green Death-"
"Red Death." A Boulder interrupts the Inflamer, making the Inflamer glare at the Boulder.
"Green Death," she hisses specifically at the Boulder, then turns her head towards him and sits up properly. "Because of the agreement of the death of the Green Death, Viggo will listen to the negotiation terms with Hiccup concerning the Green Death's pack," a couple of dragons growl at her, the tense growl making her glance at the dragons which he notices that the cove has gained more throughout this discussion.
"I want to apologize, the negotiation terms concerning your pack of dragons that you lead." She corrects herself. There's a moment of pause, him seeing if there was anything that she was going to add. He nods, knowing that this is a win in their books. With Viggo agreeing to negotiate, they can see how much he's willing to bend and make Viggo leave the archipelago.
"Ok. Boulder," there are no names between the dragons as the norm is them calling each other by their type. If there's any case that there could be multiple of the same type then they'd refer to them as the colour. "Accommodate the Inflamer and find someplace good for her." He tells the Boulder as he looks back at the Inflamer. Surprisingly, she's working for Viggo when she's a dragon but something likely because she bonded to Viggo. That made her gain the ability to talk to Viggo, something that was crucial for all of this to work. The same thing happened to both him and Hiccup, thus making him able to talk to him. The Inflamer was the messenger between Viggo and them.
He sees the pact leave with the Inflamer right behind them. He sighs, hopefully, Hiccup will wake up early for the good news as he looks towards the lake of the cove. He sees the baby dragons come flying over the cove with a small light blue Spiker leading the way past the cove. He laughs at the scene as he sees a couple of adult Spikers trying to follow them, a bit of distance behind the other dragons.
He can see a bright future with these—
"Nope," Zephyr again interrupts him making him stammer slightly as he recoils slightly. "That story also isn't very good."
He sighs, he didn't know storytelling was this hard of a chore. He needs to get to know some bedtime stories. He wonders slightly if Astrid has any herself but he'd rather not dwell on it.
"Alright," he says, not wanting to put off as bothered but deep down he knows that it's bothering him. One of the quote-unquote "simple" tasks of parenthood is just what kind of bedtime stories you like to tell your kids. Man, he should talk to Fishlegs about this, he should know about bedtime stories.
"What do you want then?" He asks with a patient voice. He sometimes feels like he's talking to an adult and sometimes he's talking to the twins when they're destroying things around the edge back in the day when he's talking to Zephyr. This is one of those times he's talking to the twins when they were doing some Thor forbidden stuff.
Her eyes light up, making his emotions slightly waver as he always loves seeing those eyes bright up. "How about something from Grandma Valka and Grandpa Stoick?"
He smiles softly, recalling the small dance that they had in the reunion at the haven. He will always treasure those moments.
"Alright," he says softly, "how about Who is it?"
…
…
The spirits are high in the village of Berk. Of course, that's a natural thing considering how the chieftess herself is pregnant with the next generation of the Haddocks. Everyone's excited who's going to lead the next generation of the Hairy Hooligan tribe and no one can contain their excitement. Everyone's gushing over the fact of how the baby is going to look like and the qualities the baby might have considering the stoic leadership qualities in Stoick the Vast and the calming, caring peacefulness in Valka the Thoughtful.
Stoick the Vast himself has evolved to become one of those doting husbands, especially this past couple of months containing Valka's pregnancy. A great leader and a somewhat patient man, he always lets Valka sleep for just a while longer while he gets ready to lead the people. It's always a routine. He wakes up early, gets ready for the day and then makes breakfast for his dearest. Today's no different.
He's currently pouring some porridge that they ate yesterday when he hears the floor creak. He turns to the glowing Valka Haddock as her hair seems to be splitting everywhere and the fact that she seems to always have a hand on her lower back. Her face shows some signs that she didn't sleep properly.
He smiles sweetly at her.
"Val," He says to her, walking towards her, taking a chair out for her to sit on as she relaxes slightly. "I'm surprised you're awake this early." He says to her and she gives off a slight smile towards her belly.
"Baby was waking me up. I swear this baby is already chief material by how early he wakes up." She jokingly says as she yawns for the first time there. He smiles as he rubs the belly. It's still amazing at the fact that it seems to respond to the motions and he feels a kick. It's been happening more and more often, a sign that the baby was starting to feel the world. His eyes slightly glaze over.
"Hmm. Porridge?" He says to her, migrating his hand from his wife's belly to rest on her shoulders, giving it a slight massage as she relaxes even more into the chair. Even with being chief, the village knows that sometimes he doesn't leave the house at the same time the sun rises from the mountains. They all know the beauty and hardships of pregnancy and have been more lenient towards the chief and his duties of peacemaking.
She finally nods after a minute or so of the massage, opening her blue eyes and gazing at the loving husband. She thought that she would go through this process alone at some times because he's chief but that seems to have brought the stubbornness of a Haddock as he changed his priorities from taking care of the village to taking care of the bundle of life and his wife. She's eternally grateful at the fact that he's taken that step early in the pregnancy.
She sees his eyes get slightly out of focus then refocus, slightly shaking his head. She smiles as she closes her eyes again. "Trouble in the village?" She asks quietly and she gets her response by the waning heat of her husband, the footsteps almost cracking under the weight of Stoick the Vast disappearing towards the kitchen. She hears movement again and opens her eyes to find Stoick putting a plate of porridge right in front of her, him moving quickly only meaning that the situation is pretty severe.
"Love you, Val, take care." He tells her, locking eyes with the beauty of Valka as she smiles towards him. She's subconsciously rubbing her belly as she raises one hand to 'shoo' him away and he chuckles.
Yeah, life's pretty amazing for the Haddocks at the moment. These are the moments he always cherishes with his wife and their unborn baby. A scene of peace and calm.
…
…
It's the middle of the day, most of the villagers eating at the Great Hall as he eats at the table, accompanied by the Hoffersons and the Jorgensons. His wife's absent from the Great Hall, him already checking on her and offering her a plate back home as she didn't seem willing to walk up so many steps to get her food.
"How is it chief?" Spitelout Jorgenson says. A gruff man with black hair and the step-brother of the chief. His stature screams a regular man and he's happy with the fact that he's become his right-hand man behind Gobber the Belch.
"She's alright," he says, continuing to eat. "The baby seems to have a chief schedule of being awake at the same time as the sun." Spitelout nods as he continues to eat. It's a silent conversation as the five continue to eat. He appreciates these moments.
"Chief," Ingrid Hofferson says and he raises his head towards the woman in question. She seems to be in slight tears but gives off a wearily smile towards him. "Your wife's water broke." She says and he widens his eyes. That's not supposed to happen. She's not due for a couple of months and he stands up, the food completely out of his mind.
"I'll be right back," He says to the people at the table, his voice slightly shaky from the revelations. He looks towards Bard Hofferson, the usually reserved man not making himself calm down in the slightest. "Can you tell Gothi to be ready and come in the house?" He says to Bard. He takes a meaningful eye-contact to Ingrid Hofferson as both Hoffersons nod towards him and that's his cue. He leaves immediately, the slight breeze making him stumble back a bit but then continues to walk down the steps.
She still wasn't due though. The baby must've done something bad for this to happen. Although it has happened before, early deliveries are few and far between, with success not really in the positive margin. He scoffs at these thoughts, running now towards the house. These thoughts are not the thoughts he should be having right now.
He rams himself towards the house, almost smashing the door open to find Valka crouching down, her moaning audible by the quietness of the house. He immediately crosses the room and crouches down to her, rubbing circles on her back.
"Hey Val," he mutters slightly, or just how his mutters can go. "Can you get up? Let's see if we can put you on the bed. It's a lot more comfortable than this floor."
Her moans indicate that she's in almost no position to do so and he takes matters into his own hands, literally. He picks her up and puts her in their bedroom, seeing her with her eyes closed. He grabs her hands and awaits for the healers to arrive.
It only took a couple of minutes as he can hear the doors open and close. He raises his eyes to find Gothi, Ingrid Hofferson as well as Sable Jorgenson. The latter two seem to have changed clothes to just basic scrubs and just nod to him. Gothi raises her hand and points towards the entrance. He frowns at her.
"I'm not leaving her Gothi. She's the chieftess."
"I do recommend that you do though," the light voice of Ingrid Hofferson pierces through and he makes eye contact with her blue eyes. "She isn't going to be extremely friendly to you throughout this ordeal. Believe me, it's better that you step outside."
His frown deepens at this statement, not wanting to leave Valka's side at all.
"Go." He hears his wife and turns towards her. She has her blue eyes open towards him and smiles sweetly. "Ingrid's right. I am going to yell at you. I've seen it with my two eyes with other women in the village. I'll be fine. We'll be fine." She emphasizes the main part of the last sentence and he reconsiders. His frown deepens but yet he nods at the persuasion of his wife. He slightly clasps his hands, trying to make a soft sound but instead booming the whole thing as he looks towards the ladies.
"Take care of her, will ya?" He asks meekly and the healers' nod. As much as everyone knows the stoic of Stoick, they also know that this mask of stoic can be broken down with anything related to his wife. With that, he leaves the room.
The living room seems to be in the living. Both Spitelout and Gobber are there present. Spitelout by being around the table and Gobber because they're connected.
It seems like his mood was visible to the naked eye as Spitelout slaps him on the shoulder. "It's alright chief. I trust the baby will be going through this like it's nothing."
"The baby's early." He says weakly towards his step-brother. "I don't think even I wanted to be this early to the world." He continues as Gobber gets up.
"Aye, Then the heir is extremely stubborn just like their father and mother." Gobber shakes his head exaggeratedly. "I can imagine a little Viking claiming to do everything before they turn one." Both he and Spitelout chuckle a bit. He doesn't find the humour just yet.
"Come on, chief," Spitelout says, his head indicating towards the outside. "Let's get you some fresh air for the moment. Let me see if I can finally tie up the score."
He glances back towards the closed door of his bedroom. As much as he wants to stay here, everyone knows that it's going to take multiple hours for the heir to be born.
"Chief," Gobber the Belch says, clasping both his prosthetic and his real hand on his shoulders, putting him back to look towards him. "I'll stay here and inform you when they're almost done. Go." With that, he nods. He smirks towards the general direction.
"I won't go easy on ya Spitelout," He says to the gruff Viking and the Viking gives his devious smirk.
"No Stoick. I don't expect you—"
Zephyr shakes his head and this time he can't suppress the groan. Man, he really can't do bedtime stories to save his life.
"No, no. I think I prefer stories between you and mommy." He wants to just yell towards Thor or Loki or whichever god that didn't give him the ability to tell a bedtime story! He just nods, his face in an extremely patient matter as he tries to do something interesting with this.
"Okay." He says, smiling softly. "Last try. You should be asleep almost an hour ago."
She nods and he tries again. "Studying," he mumbles softly.
…
…
He was walking (not running, mind you, he knows that Astrid might have a softball practice right now) towards the library with his dragon book and backpack. He's mild - extremely - irritated over what happened this morning but he can't complain about it. At least, he'll spend some forced time with Astrid again so, that's fun.
He gets past the bookshelves and he puts his backpack on his unnamed chair and opens his backpack to take something out. As he moves things around in his backpack, he finally finds the thing he wants to take out. His math work-
The clock he bought.
He smiles at the simplicity of the clock, it has a simple white background with plain black numbers. It only had the minute and hour hand so there's no more of the tick-tock noise that the clock that's on the wall currently has. It's extremely simple, but that's how he likes it anyway. It only cost him ten dollars from the store so he took the opportunity to buy it.
He's holding his clock out in front of him as he glances at his clock and the clock on the wall. He just realizes something, though...
The clock on the wall is much higher than he thought.
He scrunches his eyes at the clock on the wall for a little bit until something horrible happened.
"Hiccup?" Astrid's voice rings behind him.
His manly (trust me, it certainly wasn't high-pitched at all) scream went all over the library as he jumps a little and dropped his clock, thus shattering the clock.
He dropped his clock...
He goes down on his knees as he tries to pick up the pieces. "No! no, no, no, no, no, no," he mumbles, not even registering that Astrid is right behind him.
Well, that goes one clock down.
He's still on his knees with his head hung low. Man, even the gods have to laugh a little and he's okay with him tripping on air and stuff like that, but to break the clock that took him, at least, thirty (Actually, just five minutes, he was busy that day) minutes to find. How could the gods hate him that much?
So he might be a little exaggerating on the fact that it only took him so little time to find a clock. He guesses he'll have to go to the clock shop again and buy another clock, that's okay.
He sighs at the pieces, then realizes he has to pick up the pieces. He starts picking them up as he mentally notes something.
'Don't buy a glass clock.'
"Here," a voice says to his left as the person gives him a plastic bag to put all the broken pieces. Again, his mind doesn't register that it was Astrid who gave it to him as he put all the pieces in the bag.
"Thanks," he responds, "well that goes one clock. Hope that the next one will live a much longer life don't you?" he says at the person without even looking at the said person as he's too busy picking up all the pieces.
"Yeah. Why are you buying a clock in the first place?" The voice responds.
"Because this clock that we have in the library is way too loud and annoying. Someone told me to buy a new one so I took the opportunity and did that."
He finally gets up as he wipes his hands on his pants. "Going to have to buy a new one, though. Guess that's what happens when you're... c-c-clumsy." He stutters as he turns around to finally see who helped him on cleaning up the pieces.
It's Astrid as his brain finally registers that, but she doesn't have that common annoyed look on her face. It seems amused, humoured as she probably saw how deflated his face was when his beautiful clock broke.
"Uh, hi, Astrid," the same three words he said to her last time except in a completely different situation. It's already embarrassing enough that she saw him drop the clock, but he guesses it's all worth it, as he sees a bit of humour in her eyes.
"Hi Hiccup, forgot that we're supposed to be 'studying'?" She has one hand to make air quotes as the other hand was holding her backpack straps. Hiccup himself was the one carrying the bag with the broken clock pieces.
He blushed, "Yeah, um. I'll just leave this at, uh, the front counter, alright?" he timidly tells her as he starts to walk towards the librarian.
As he walks towards the front of the library did he start talking to himself, "of course it was Astrid. It couldn't have been someone else, the librarians don't even come here."
He makes it to the front counter with the plastic bag, "uh, excuse me."
The librarian raises her head from the book she was reading, "yes?"
"Where do I put this?" He says looking at the bag of broken clock pieces. He still can't believe that he dropped it right before putting it on the wall.
The librarian blinks, "Oh so that was the thing that dropped. Wow, you can just leave it here and go back to your girlfriend."
He goes beet red, "what? No... no, no, no." His hand that wasn't holding the bag was up and shaking, "she isn't my girlfriend."
The librarian quickly apologizes, "Oh I'm so sorry, it's just that it seemed like you guys wanted to be alone and this was the perfect place and-"
Hiccup, again, has a tomato face, "yeah, no. Not the way you pictured it. Yup. Going to leave this now. Thanks—"
He stops himself as he looks towards his daughter, her eyes closing slightly as he's happy with the fact that the fourth story finally seals the deal. He smiles at her, leaning towards his daughter and kisses her forehead, putting the covers on her frame. "I love you Zeph," he says quietly, getting up and stretching.
"Hey dad," he hears her softly, making him turn to her. He sees his wife's eyes on her as he sits down softly to hear her daughter better.
"Your stories were all great."
…
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April Fools! Originally I was going to upload a chapter of old Marriage but I have a feeling that most people wouldn't enjoy that prank so I just uploaded a bunch of stories that are slowly in the making as well as a quick treat of old Marriage chapter that I had. The harshest critic is sometimes yourself so I decided to just have Zephyr be that part of me who always complains about my stories.
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Created: March 18, 2020
First Draft Complete: March 20, 2020
Second Draft Complete: March 25, 2020
Published: April 1, 2020