Spawn Hades - I actually have like, four different scenarios penned for that. However, Hiccup and Valka haven't even met yet, so anyone reacting to finding out anything about them is a way off.
Guest - I do like writing Valcup, it's good to be back!
Other Guest - uh, I can't actually imagine Hiccup adopting Astrid, with their close ages and all that. It would be very odd if she were to start calling him dad, I agree!
Normally line breaks in my stories indicate a POV change, but in this chapter its a time jump still in Hiccup's POV.
-HTTYD-
The adoption issue was still to one side - Hiccup couldn't legally contact his birth mother until he was eighteen, and there was much to be done before then.
Like filing a complaint against Bertha for prematurely handing over that information, and thankfully her replacement was young Gus, plus a silent woman who just followed him around but let him do his work.
Then Hiccup had to chase Astrid to get her to the dentists, laughing when the man told his sister she needed to eat less sweets. Astrid threatened to bite him.
"I didn't miss basketball practice to be lectured! I brush twice a day, floss and mouthwash and I don't even eat that much junk anymore. He just likes to stare into my eyes."
Astrid grumbled - while eating chocolate, ironically - as they drove home, her spreading out across the floor with study material while Hiccup sat at the table. He felt like drawing again for the first time in weeks, doodling a little cat-like dragon creeping along to burn Astrid's homework. She found it hilarious, demanding he colour it in so she could hang it in her room.
"I'll finish it tomorrow, I'm getting hand cramp. I'm seriously out of practice. I promise I'll finish the Terrible Homework Terror for you."
"Thanks bro. What's for dinner?"
"You can pick, I need to tidy up the table."
He put the drawing aside, freeing up their space to eat and ensuring none of his pencils would roll off and break or be selected by Toothless for chewing. Well, gumming.
"Stir fry? This chicken goes out of date in two days, better use it up now."
"Sure. Can you prep the veg while I pre-cook this?"
Astrid was generally a danger in the kitchen, but man could she handle a sharp blade. Hiccup cooked the chicken, then tossed it in with the vegetables, noodles, beansprouts and garlic-chilli stir fry sauce. Astrid pulled out the defrosted cheesecake from the fridge to have for afters, clearing both her large plate of stir fry and a generous serving of banoffee cheesecake.
"Uh, that was so good. I hope you realise if we ever live apart I'm going to be coming over for food and demanding at least one cake a week to take home."
"I'm your big brother, I'll always take care of you Astrid."
"I know bro. I'm just placing this as a standing order now, since you make cake at least weekly anyway."
Hiccup laughed, stumbling upright to make hot chocolate and sitting back down with Astrid as they digested.
"So, you still set on doing A-Levels?"
"Yep. Psychology, English and maybe a STEM class. Why?"
"Because I need to demonstrate that I'm supporting your future options, so I better get some of those prospectus things and help you choose colleges and sixth forms that offer the courses you want."
Astrid slurped her hot chocolate, humming in thought.
"Focus on good English and Psychology places, I'll see what other courses they offer and go from there."
"Alright. What is it you want to do?"
"Be a counsellor. Ours have been amazing, they've really helped us. I want to do that, but then I don't want to limit my options. And I really like English."
"I have no doubt you'll be amazing at whatever you do baby sister. I'll get on that tomorrow."
"Don't forget-"
"I haven't missed a game yet. I'll be there cheering for you."
She smiled, checked the time and grabbed hold of Hiccup's leg.
"I'm fine!"
Astrid rolled her eyes, detaching his prosthetic and beginning to perform the special massage on his stump.
"You're fine because I do this every day, stop complaining and accept that I am compelled to take care of you wherever possible."
Hiccup didn't like his leg, it was scarred and ugly and a constant reminder of the accident that took their parents away. Astrid was completely unfazed by it, didn't so much as blink while softening and caring for the thick scar tissue.
"Ok, you're all done. I'll let Toothless out, then I'm off to bed. You stay there and rest for five minutes. Hel, ten. Or I'll take your leg."
Hiccup frowned, but stayed where he was while his leg relaxed again. Astrid smiled when she saw he had stayed still, came over to hug and kiss him goodnight.
"Your uniform and game kit clean?"
"Yep."
"Lunch box?"
Astrid pouted, but came out with the empty box with a sheepish grin.
"Alright, off to bed. I'll pack you extra snacks for before your game."
"Freeze my spare water bottle too, it'll defrost in the day and be cold after."
"I presume you want me to put water in it first?"
Astrid rolled her eyes.
"Asshole. Yes. Love you bro."
"Love you sis."
She headed to bed, the time limit elapsing for Hiccup to get up and put pn his leg again, hobbling over to the kitchen to ensure he put together the extras for Astrid tomorrow - protein bar, fruit and nut packs and her 'guilty' sweet treat of jelly beans. A good sugar boost wasn't bad for her in moderation, especially for someone as active as Astrid.
Water bottle placed in the freezer for the night, Hiccup took himself off to bed for the night. After dropping Astrid off at school, he went for his weekly PTSD therapy session and poured out a jumble of emotions from his nightmares. Hiccup hated doing it, but knew he had to work at it if he had any hope of recovering from the disorder.
"You're coming along very well Henry" this therapist didn't like calling him Hiccup "I'm very proud of your progress."
"Really? I feel like I'm going nowhere."
"You have a skewed view of yourself, which is very common. Tell me how Astrid is doing."
Hiccup was astounded by his sister - she could still cry about losing their parents, but she was determined to make them proud, to make the most of her life.
"Brilliantly. The teachers offered her the predicted grades grief clause, but she said no and now they are expecting her to exceed her previous predictions. Astrid really wants to do well, and she's well on her way to doing so."
She let him talk about Astrid for another few minutes, much happier to show her in positive light.
"Henry, do you not realise that as her primary carer, you are the main support Astrid has? You ensure everything is going as well as it can to facilitate a good, nurturing environment for her to flourish in."
Hiccup shrugged, staring at his stupid metal leg.
"Astrid would be doing well without me. She would be doing even better if I had died in that accident, not our parents."
"Henry, they were your parents. They would have voluntarily died in that accident a hundred times to protect you."
He bit his lip, unsure if he wanted to bring it up.
"I'm adopted. I only found out recently."
His therapist blinked in surprise, but didn't even note it down.
"You think that changes it? Your parents chose to take you into their family."
"Huh. Guess I didn't think of it like that."
"You never knew. They never treated you as anything other than their own. You are still their son Henry."
He left that session feeling completely wrung out, chest tight with anxiety as he crawled into his car and tried to breathe. Calmer, he drove himself home and curled up in a ball on the sofa with Toothless until the little pest demanded a walk. Carefully timing it, Hiccup gave him an hour on the fields, then went online back home and started trawling for good colleges, ordering the shiny books full of information for Astrid to peruse at her leisure.
Then it was time to fill the 'parent' role again, easily the youngest person in the stands there alone as the schools mixed-gender basketball team went out. It was only mixed because Astrid didn't want to be in netball - she preferred basketball and kept turning up to try outs until they took her on. Once that happened, several more girls started trying out and now there were three girls on the team.
Other schools had argued about playing them... Astrid generally went out of her way to wipe the floor with them.
She waved up at Hiccup in the stands as she came out in the school colours where he was sat next to one of those dads who only came because their wife made them, grumbling about 'girls on the field'.
"That your girlfriend emasculating the entire sport?"
He gruffed in Hiccup's direction, scowling at the female players.
"No. My little sister, and she will happily emasculate you in person if you like."
The man recoiled at Hiccup's glare, standing up with a protruding beer gut and insisting his wife take the spot next to Hiccup instead. She winked at him, then turned to start cheering as the game began.
The opposing team initially expected little of the female players, exceptionally unhappy when they realised they were getting their ass kicked. Astrid sank a three pointer and one of the other team physically barged her, almost knocking her down and Hiccup almost jumped down to knock him down. Astrid's teammates stepped in, giving the boy a hearty shove back. The referee eventually stepped in and warned both sides, then the game resumed.
Astrid's school team won regardless of the dirty tactics from their opponents, and she was beaming when Hiccup went to congratulate her.
"You did great Astrid! Where is that ass who hit you, I want a word."
"Leave it. He goes to the gym Dagur works at... he won't get away lightly. Let's go home, I'm starving and dying for a shower."
Hiccup took her home, cooking dinner while she showered, changed and dumped her dirty gym clothes in front of the washing machine.
"Thanks for coming today."
"Told you, I won't miss a match unless I'm dead."
Astrid grinned, stuffing her mouth full of spaghetti bolognese - the mix of protein and carbohydrates she needed to refuel after a match. What the therapist said earlier rang in his ears - Astrid was doing well, and he was doing his best to support her. Maybe he wasn't doing so bad.
The phone had never looked scarier. Hiccup took in a deep breath, puffed out his cheeks and blew out the breath again.
"You don't have to do this Hiccup, you realise that?"
"I'm not really, am I? I'm calling the adoption agency and saying they can give her my number. That way, I won't stir up old wounds if she doesn't wanna know me."
Heather - snoop extraordinaire - had tried to find out anything about Valka Haddock online, but only found surface information. There was nothing to even indicate she still lived in the UK at all. He'd seen her though, a grainy black and white newspaper photo in a little local blotter. Her boyfriend at the time had won a football tournament, and she was pictured next to him in the report - apparently it had been a big deal.
"Wow. She looks kinda like you. With more hair."
"And bigger tits."
"Dagur!"
Heather swatted her brother, Astrid too busy examining the otherwise unremarkable picture.
"Reckon that's your biological father?"
"Stoick the Vast? Yeah, I, Hiccup came from that mountain. Plus if he was her boyfriend, why would she give me up?"
"I guess. From the date on this article and your age, this can only have been about three years before you were born."
"In the space of one year Heather went from dating me to dating you. Three years is plenty."
He had looked at the picture again and again, trying to discern things the picture didn't show. Did he have her eye colour? Hair colour? It was too old and of poor quality to even be sure if Hiccup had her freckles.
Which brought him back to the phone call, Astrid eventually dialling the number for him when his hands shook too much. It took several attempts for him to even explain himself to the poor man on the phone, who had to try and make sense of the awkward babbling idiot that was Hiccup Hofferson.
"You know usually, we encourage the child to reach out to the parent."
"Yeah, but I don't want to be calling her up and getting her new husband or a half sister or something. I just... I don't think I can do it. Can you do this? I mean, are you allowed or is it against the rules?"
"No, it's still within our remit. It's just unusual Mr Hofferson. Would you like to leave a phone number, an address to write to?"
He wavered - what if she wanted to write him? What if she just turned up? That would be scary.
"Just a number will be ok. Hey, could she have tracked me down at eighteen too or is it on me to make the first move?"
The man could be heard tapping away, silence wearing on Hiccup considerably.
"The biological parent can make a request, often in the form of updating their contact information with us to ensure we can reach them should you choose to contact them. However, your adoptive parents would have been our first call in that instance."
More tapping. Hiccup pictured a confused young man with a headset listening to him babble away.
"In this case... yes, she left forwarding details when you turned sixteen, as she was only in the country for a month. We will contact the person listed, and presumably they can pass on your details. With your permission to pass them on to a third party, that is."
She wanted to meet him two years ago. He wondered if she had given up now.
"Yeah, uh, yeah that's fine. Does she know my name is different?"
"We will include that information. We can't release it until you're eighteen."
Hiccup's eighteenth birthday was the very next day, but he wanted to be able to spend the day not thinking about the adoption thing - they were going to visit their parents graves, and then there would be preparing for hearings to ensure Astrid was staying with him until eighteen, when she would no longer be the social services' responsibility.
"That's ok then. I uh, won't be around much to answer the phone over the next week, if she even decided to contact me that soon but still-"
Astrid placed a hand over his mouth and plucked the phone from his hand.
"This is starting to wear on my brother, so yeah include a note that he's busy for the week after his birthday and all will be good. That will be all, bye!"
She hung up, putting the landline phone back in its cradle.
"What did you do that for?"
"You were starting to wind yourself up, I didn't want you giving yourself a panic attack."
He hadn't realised until Astrid said that that he was overlywarm, skin prickling and heart pounding with nerves.
"Fair enough. I need to walk Toothless, you wanna come?"
Astrid nodded, changing into her walking boots. They had much more time together now - she only went to college three days a week for English, Psychology and Technology, having passed her exams with flying colours. It would be one final boost when it came to proving Hiccup was fit to stay her guardian, that she had done better than predicted at her GCSE's after turning down the grief clause pass.
Toothless ambled along at Hiccup's side, waiting patiently to be let off the leash before he and Astrid pelted around the field. Hiccup sat on the bench and smiled as he watched them, half-wishing he could get up and join them but he was currently adjusting to his newest prosthetic - as he grew, he needed new ones to match or he would walk lopsided. With any luck, his latest would be his last re-fit but apparently it wasn't uncommon to need another by the time he turned twenty one.
"How's your leg?"
Astrid flopped on the bench next to him, out of breath and defeated by Toothless who was still going strong.
"Doesn't hurt, just feels odd after wearing the last one in. Like new shoes. Well. Shoe. I can't feel this foot."
She chuckled, taking the offered water bottle from Hiccup's hand.
"What do you even say to her? Hi, I'm the son you gave up."
He leant back against the bench, sighing to himself.
"I don't know. I guess I'm hoping I'll know when it happens. Of course, I'm Hiccup. It's bound to be awkward."
"Well, we can talk to mom and dad about it tomorrow. I'm sure we'll figure it out bro."
If asked, Hiccup suspected most people wouldn't answer "how did you spend your eighteenth birthday?" with "visiting my parents graves", but he needed to go. Needed to talk to them about how just because he wanted to see where he came from, that he still thought of them as his parents regardless.
He hoped they could hear him from Valhalla.
Astrid sat with him at the graves, cracking jokes about how their dad had always expected Hiccup to one day fill out as he aged.
"He's still our number one talking fishbone."
"I hate you."
Astrid flashed her most charming smile, beaming cheekily.
"I love you too bro."
Hiccup traced the etching in their head-stones, 'gone too soon' always the part that brought a lump in his throat to choke him with emotion. It was so painfully true - they didn't even get to see Astrid graduate school.
They spent hours there, talking to each other and their parents until they couldn't feel their legs. Which Astrid always laughed when he said.
"Can you still feel it?"
Astrid asked as they got into the car, ready to head home and eat birthday cake in their pyjamas.
"I do still get phantom pains sometimes, but mostly I just forget I don't have toes to stretch when I get out of bed."
"Is it weird? It sounds weird. I can't imagine looking down and not seeing what I can feel."
"I'm used to it. Come on, Toothless must be bored out of his gourd."
He started the car, driving them home to wash up, change, eat and begin to prepare all the paperwork that showed how Hiccup had kept Astrid in school, therapy, taken her to doctors and dentists appointments, with high attendance, high grades and extra curricular activities. She was attending college and doing well at it.
That actually kept him busy enough that he had little time to dwell on the anticipation of this potential phone call that could fit missing pieces back together in his life. His adoptive parents would always be his parents, but Hiccup wanted to know where his scruffy hair and green eyes and freckles came from. Maybe even his height - he might be skinny, but Hiccup had achieved six feet in height already and neither their mother or father were taller than five foot eight.
It was confusing.
A heart-wrenching two hearings later, Hiccup was cleared to continue taking care of Astrid with no need for their uncle to move in. It was the best news he could have hoped for, both he and Astrid cheering in the hallway outside the small court room. The judge's parting words would stay with him.
"Frankly, you're doing a better job than some adult parent couples, and you're just a boy. I see no reason to put the two of you through any further upheaval."
Now all he had left to dwell on was whether or not his birth mother was going to call. Hiccup did his best not to watch the phone, but he still did it. Astrid seemed to be on tenterhooks for him also, mounting tension beginning to buzz around them.
"Maybe she's not gonna call. I should give up. She's changed her mind."
Hiccup sighed into his cup of tea, free hand busying itself crushing a digestive biscuit to pieces.
"She made sure they would be able to get hold of her in a different country Hiccup. Maybe whatever she's doing over there keeps her busy and she wants to call when she has some time. Maybe she's in one of those tiny villages with no phone service."
"Or maybe she's met someone new and has a family. We have no idea what kind of woman she is Astrid."
He took a breath, mounting anxiety starting to make him irritable. Thankfully, Astrid didn't take it personally.
"Maybe. But... she did want to talk to you two years ago. That's sixteen years after she gave you up. I just don't see her changing her mind now. Hel, she might be just as nervous as you, she might feel she has no right to be in your life and maybe she's scared you'll reject her. Adoption is a deep, deep thing Hiccup."
He nodded, continuing to destroy the biscuits until Astrid moved the plate away, sticking her tongue out when he glared.
"I wonder if there's a time difference. Like, it's six in the evening here. What if it's like, four in the morning where she is and you're on different timelines?"
"No clue. They couldn't tell me where she was, only that there was someone who could get a hold of her. Cross-continental intermediary. I wonder why she didn't stay in the UK. I mean, she went to school in Scotland according to that article, but I was born in England."
"Maybe she had family down here who offered to support her."
It was all conjecture, but conjecture was all HIccup had to go on to stop him going crazy waiting.
"Maybe. I could have grandparents who have walked past me and never known."
"I doubt that. She looked like you in that picture, I figure they would have recognised you."
"But never said anything because they didn't know if I knew?"
"I guess. A lot of things are plausible, but only she can give you these answers."
Hiccup sighed, leaning back in his seat and just about leaping out of his skin when the phone rang.
He just stared at it for a second, heart thundering in his chest.
"If you don't answer it, I will."
Swallowing thickly, Hiccup reached for the phone before it rang off, sweaty hand slipping on the handset.
"Hello?"
-HTTYD-
Quite a lot of this 'adopted' stuff is inspired by a storyline in Young Dracula, where my brother-sister OTP (Valcup wasn't my first foray into incest) are. Though obviously, the HTTYD2 storyline and Hiccup and Valka meeting as adults means this modern AU has a canon flavour... up until the incest that is.