A/N:
Hi, there! I was just feeling cozy all of the sudden, so I began writing down some Haddock 'fluff' (I guess you can call it 'fluff', but I'm not so sure, lol). And tadaa! This is the outcome! ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ
Enjoy it while it lasts!
Timeline: POST-HTTYD2, Stoick lives AU (outfit from HTTYD2)
Rating: K
Genre/Topic: Family, mother/son Bonding, slight Humor
Wordcount: 1K
Inspiration: SyrupWriter (myself)
A week! It had been a week! Really!? How did a full week pass by that fast? And how was there still no progress!?
How come an entire set of seven days hadn't been enough time to train the Riders with a new exercise? A week long Hiccup had been trying to get the Riders to focus during his lessons. Did they listen? No! And the fact that it wasn't at all the dragons who were the core problem made it all the way worse.
But, it was now a new morning, the start of a new day with endless new possibilities. Yet to Hiccup, a new day would most certainly be another twelve hours wasted on nothing but trying to get his friends to listen. And then, obviously, not succeeding.
This morning, Hiccup walked down the stairs, looking both physically and mentally tired, which had already occurred many times in the past week. He knew what today's outcome was going to be; exactly like all the other days prior to this one.
His parents Stoick and Valka had noticed his... struggles, to say it simple. Their son had come late every day for the past week, telling them about how much he hadn't accomplished that day. Then the morning after would usually contain a Hiccup filled with hope, which would, along the hours of the day, end up crushed by his dragon riding friends.
And why? Well, all because they didn't listen. Didn't even care to look at what their leader was doing. And didn't bother to pause the hours they spent fighting, arguing, sleeping... and then followed by even more fighting.
"How's it going?" Stoick asked with a teasing tone the second he noticed his son's appearance, although he already knew the answer to his question. But he still needed Hiccup to confront it himself and speak his clouded mind in doing so, it would definitely help the boy to come to a natural place.
"Great. Amazing." Hiccup quipped unusually excited with lame jazzhands before he plopped down at the table his father sat at, too, clearly not having meant any of what he claimed.
"Aye..." Stoick nodded and raised his eyebrow over the sets of paper, which he secretly intended to hold before his face, in suspicion.
"Yup, ha-ha." Hiccup laughed fakely, rubbing the back of his neck uncomfortably, smiling through his sets of lies. "Never been better. You know what they say, uhh... 'a happy leader is a happy-'... uhh."
At that somewhat unfaithful moment, Valka walked past the table with a basket of fish in her arms. "It's better to speak what's on your mind, son." She winked at Hiccup before passing by and eventually coming to a stop besides Toothless, dropping down the breakfast which the dragon immediately munched down his throat. Gurgling happily at his Rider's mother as a thanking gesture. Perhaps Valka was bad at cooking human food, but fish was something she could serve very well. Dragon approved, no less!
"Yes, speak up. You should know better than to disobey your mother..." Stoick chuckled at the opposite side of the table, immediately raising the sets of paper higher to, again, avoid eye contact with Valka, who was now glaring at him for his slightly offending comment.
Hiccup groaned inwardly, preparing himself for his upcoming outburst. "Okay, look. Astrid and Snotlout can't keep their hands off each other, fighting is all they think about!" He swung his hands around, gesturing every single word he spoke. "The twins don't listen..." He grimaced. "Well, they don't ever." Hiccup noted with an eye roll while Valka nodded with her hands on her hips, listening intrigued in the background.
"But Fishlegs does listen to them, which causes him to lose required sleep because he's scared of Tuffnut's typical horror stories! Therefore making Fishlegs physically unable to listen to me since he, well... sleeps during my lessons!" Hiccup brushed his hand through his hair when he finally finished, breathing heavily to the motion of his heaving chest.
"Felt good, right?"
"It did." Hiccup sighed, somewhat feeling content with himself. "Dammit, it did feel good." He cursed himself. "Yet it doesn't fix anyth—"
"Not my problem, then." The chief noted immediately, somewhat proud of his very helpful words.
"Uhg, but what am I going to actually do, dad?" Hiccup moaned in response to him, dropping his forehead onto the table in absolute defeat. "It's been a week filled with disappointment..." He told to the ground under the wooden table.
"Think it out." Valka simply answered as she approached her husband and son again and sat down next to Hiccup. "With your friends. Together." She said reassuring, ruffling his fluffy head of hair, which automatically sent comfortable tickles all over Hiccup's spine.
"Yeah?" He lifted his head back up, facing her with hope sparkling in his green eyes. Hiccup then turned his head around to give his dad a look, in search for agreement to Valka's wise words.
But Stoick barely moved a limb, which Hiccup was very thankful for, showing just that with an unambiguous glare.
"Try talking with them." Suggested Valka with a confident tone, knowing exactly that what she was saying was right. "Communication is key to a healthy team."
"But that's the point; they don't listen when I want to talk." Hiccup plopped his crossed arms back on the table, resting his chin on top in equal fatigue. "All they do is terrorize the village, and if not that, each other." He mumbled with an irritated and drained expression, where after Stoick silently nodded in agreement; the village had been terrorized, indeed. "I mean, they have this rule, like 'force before listening'. They follow it better than any of my rules."
"Trick them into listening to your rules, then." Valka patted his shoulder as she pushed herself up, away from the table, with her other arm. "Make use of their logic." She noted at last, planning to go back to the kitchen to get more fish for the dragons.
When in an instant, Hiccup jolted his head up to his standing mother, suddenly gaining an extraordinary crazy idea in mind. "Wait... You- you're right!" He exasperated and subconsciously pointed at Valka, coming to the realization of an actual working solution, no matter the quite possible risks that came along with said idea. "Thank you!" Hiccup jumped up and hugged his mom, she recoiled instantly, not processing what was happening.
Stoick dropped his papers and smiled broadly from his seat, laughing at Valka's surprised expression. After a beat, she finally understood the gesture and embraced her son back with ultimate care. Even after twenty years of having been separated from other rational humans, her heart still knew how to handle a loving family.
Her family.
"I'm going!" Hiccup yelled enthusiastically as they parted their hug, his green eyes showing their true colors of joy again.
"We know..." Stoick mumbled before raising his papers further and continuing to read again, having gotten used to his son's typical antics which only showed themselves when the boy had an idea, most likely something crazy.
No... more like 'probably something stupid'.
Hiccup whistled to Toothless as he ran by the dragon, signaling for him to follow. With Toothless directly hot on his tail, crooning full excitement, they both jumped out the entrance. Valka quickly made her way to the still open door and waved to her son as he mounted his Night Fury on their front porch and took off into the early morning.
"You're a genius, mom!" Hiccup yelled before dissappearing in the distance.
"He's right." Stoick said nonchalantly as Valka closed the door with a smile and turned around to continue her morning. "I didn't marry you for your cooking, obviously." This made her flinch.
"I thank your observations... But my 'genius' mind suggests you to keep things to yourself, Stoick." Valka said bitter sweet, her stance and tone seeming challenging.
"Aye, woman!"
A/N:
The end! Now you should know that 'one's mother's advice keeps one up throughout life'. Yeah, okay, I just made that line up on the spot... But I still think there's some truth in that!
Thank you all SO much for reading! Know that you're appreciated! (｡•́‿•̀｡)