Work Text:
Dedue sat on the edge of his bed, rubbing the nape of his neck. As he slowly laid down on his bed, he let out a loud groan. When he tried to sleep, he tossed and turned, unable to sleep. He laid on his back, staring at the ceiling. If it weren’t for Dimitri insisting on him taking, at least, a week off from work, he wouldn’t have a problem sleeping. Dedue stared at his ceiling until his eyes burned from tiredness, forcing him to fall asleep.
In the morning, he didn’t do much. All he did was make himself something warm to eat before going back into his room. At first, reading kept his mind off of things. While he was reading, his mind started to wonder. He closed his book, placing it on his desk before leaving his room. Dedue walked through the castle halls until he felt the cold air hit his face.
He let out a breath and continued to walk. Dedue made his way through the town, seeing the many children. They were making snowmen, making snow angels, and throwing snowballs at each other’s faces. Hearing their laughs, it reminded him of the winters back home he spent with his family. He faintly smiled as he remembered the times when he and his sister would chase their dad into the forest pelting him with snowballs. After their snowball fights, they would all go home and cook with the whole family.
“Due, Dedue,” a voice faintly said.
He shook his head, realizing that there was someone in front of him. “Oh, Annette.”
“Hehe, are you doing okay,” she chuckled.
“Yes, why do you ask,” he asked, softly.
“You seemed like you were lost in thought,” she said, adjusting the grocery bag in her arms.
“I’m sorry, I didn't mean to cause you alarm,” he reassured her, offering to take the bag from her. “I was just remembering something.”
“Oh, thank you, but I can get the bag. Thank you though,” she smiled at him. She tilted her head before she began to walk through the town. “What were you thinking about?”
“My family,” he said, following her. Dedue let out another sigh as he continued to watch the children play. “Much like these children, my sister and I would spend many hours outside. When we would get too cold, we would go home to cook to help warm ourselves up.”
Annette faintly smiled as she saw the pain he showed her.
“Don’t worry too much about it,” he reassured her, looking at her face. “They are long gone. There is nothing we can do.”
Annette let out a little sigh as they continued to walk.
“What are you going to make,” Dedue asked, changing the subject.
“Oh,” she exclaimed, looking through her ingredients. She shuffled through to make sure that she had everything. “I’m going to make Two Fish Saute! I have the Caledonian Gar, the Albinean Herring, and the butter. Hmmm, am I missing anything?”
“Do you have herbs or a side,” he reminded her. Before he could say anything else, he watched her rush back to the market. Before he could go help her, he was out of his sight.
Shaking his head, Dedue kept on walking through the town. While he was walking, he saw many people struggling with anything. He ended up helping around as much as he could. He held on to a little child to put a carrot nose on a snowman. He helped an old woman put decorations on her house. Before he knew it, it was nighttime. He walked back to the castle and got ready for bed, instantly going to sleep.
Within the next couple of days, he was becoming restless. He tried to help around the castle with the cooks, helping Annette with cleaning the library, Ashe with the garden, Felix with his training. They all told him not to worry and to go do something else. He tried reading again, tried getting fresh air again, he tried to pick up sewing with Mercedes. None of it was working.
As the days went on, nothing was getting better. He would overhear whispers from his friends and acquaintances. He let out a sigh as he chugged along with his day. It started like any other, trying to find something to do, have Dimitri tell him to go relax. Then he would go back to his room to try to relax, only to feel his muscles tense up.
Dedue let out a groan as he laid down on his bed. “Only a couple of more days,” he whispered to himself.
While he stared at the ceiling, a million thoughts went through his head. A few seconds later, he could hear laughing outside of his room. Shortly after that, a few snowballs were thrown into his room. Dedue took a look out of his window, seeing Annette laughing and waving her hand.
“Dedue,” she laughed. “Come join me!”
He faintly smiled as he went to join her. When he did, he was also met by Dimitri, Mercedes, Felix, Ashe, Sylvain, Ingrid, and Byleth.
“Annette told us you were feeling lonely after the day she talked to you in town the other day,” Dimitri smiled.
“While we can’t replace your family,” Felix grumbled. He took one deep breath in and exhaled it. “We can still be your family.”
“Pained you to say that, didn’t it,” Dedue said, trying to tease him.
“Very,” he agreed. “Don’t make me say it again.”
Dedue nodded. He took some snow and clumped it together. Before he could throw it, Felix already threw the one at him. His smirk quickly was wiped off of his face when Dedue pelted him with even more snowballs. It quickly became an all out brawl. Dedue was chasing after Felix, Ashe and Dimitri ganged up on Sylvain, and Annette and Mercedes were going after Ingrid and Byleth.
After a while, all of them came up with a game. A few people were given thirty seconds to hide, after that thirty seconds, one person would go find them. If the person hiding was hit by a snowball they were out. If the person trying to find someone was hit with a snowball they would lose. The first person out would become the next person to hunt everyone else down. For the first game, Dedue had to go first.
He walked deep into the forest. It didn’t take him long to find the first person, Felix. Dedue knew he was going to be ambitious and try to hit him first, but he was able to take advantage of it and hit him with a snowball. He faintly smirked as he heard the Duke of Fraldarius let out a loud groan making his way to the beginning of the course.
Next was Dimitri, who was hiding with Ashe behind a few bushes. He pretended not to see them, sneaking up behind them and hitting them with snowballs. Next was Ingrid, who was always in some place high. Dedue grabbed snow off the ground, making it in a snowball, and throwing it into the tree. When he heard a thud, followed by her yelling ‘ow,’ he knew she was out.
Then there was Sylvain, he at least put up a fight. It was back and forth, back and forth until Sylvain got distracted by Byleth. Dedue was able to hit Sylvain in the back of the head. He wasn’t able to get Byleth since they were able to retreat before he was able to do anything. Annette, was of course, with Mercedes. They both tried to hide and on opposite sides to ambush him. It didn’t work so well. Dedue walked up on Annette, spooking her. It also scared Mercedes into showing herself. He was able to hit the two of them easily.
Byleth, the last one left. The hardest person to hit. They scattered around the area, trying to throw him off his game. Every once in a while, they would throw a snowball at him, missing everytime. Whenever he thought he had a chance, he would hit Byleth, missing just as much as they would. At one point, Byleth made the mistake of showing themself. It gave Dedue the perfect chance to hit them with a snowball. He was the winner of this round.
When he was able to hide, he was one of the hardest to find. Most of the time, he was either the last one to be out of the game. Or he was able to hit the hunter and complete that round. When the last game finished, they all met up near the castle.
“You know what we should have,” Sylvain suggested with a giant smile on his face.
“I hope it’s nothing promiscuous, Sylvain,” Dimitri said, gruffly.
“You’re Majesty, why would you even say that,” he asked, his mouth agape. He let out a little sigh, shrugging as soon as he saw everyone’s looks. “No, that wasn’t what I was going to suggest.”
“What were you going to suggest,” Ingrid glared at him.
“I was going to suggest we have a punishment for the person who lost most of the rounds for this game,” Sylvain sighed.
“Oh,” she said, with a sigh of relief.
“Yesh,” he sighed again, making his way over to Felix.
Felix groaned. “That means I have to cook.”
“I thought you enjoyed cooking,” Dedue said.
His eyebrows began to twitch. He shook his head, letting out a sigh. “Fine, I’ll do it.”
Dedue shook his head and watched everyone walk back into the castle. He saw that Annette turned around to face him. He followed her as she tilted her head towards the door. When he got to the kitchen, he sat next to Sylvain and Annette, listening to them talk. He didn’t mince a word, he just listened and watched everyone. At the end of the night, he went back to his room, falling asleep instantly.