The Misadventures of Byleth The Babysitter

Beware The Slither-ers!

Byleth stood awkwardly in front of the three children, not sure what she should do. She could easily leave them to themselves, her hot coffee and new comic book awaiting her in the kitchen, but she knew that wasn't right. She would have to pull through until nap time to be by herself. Whatever. She could entertain them, she supposed.

She took a sweeping gaze over the three of them sitting before her. Edelgard had pulled out her book from her backpack, sitting cross-legged and focusing solely on its contents. It was... a pretty large book, actually. And there were no pictures? What kind of kid was this? That looked like the kind of book Byleth should have been reading for a school assignment.

Dimitri held his lion backpack close to his chest, chin tucked in the mane of the bag. He was staring at his blue shoes - Byleth realized belatedly that he was extremely color-coordinated, or maybe just really liked the color blue - but his eyes seemed to not really be seeing them. He was probably lost in thought. ... Lost in thought about what? What do kids get lost in thought about? Maybe he was daydreaming about being a knight or a prince.

Claude was...

Wait.

Somehow, while she was looking over Edelgard and Dimitri, Claude had vanished. Panic had settled in her stomach but she hid it with a blank expression. "Edelgard, Dimitri," the two kids looked up at her, "h-have you seen Claude?"

Edelgard turned back to her book with little interest to Byleth's dilemma. "Isn't it your job to look after him?"

Byleth balled her hands into fists to prevent her from taking out her anger on a child. She decided to turn to Dimitri, who obviously seemed more likely to help than Edelgard.

Seeing her gaze fall onto him, Dimitri looked back towards his shoes. "N-no, but I could help you look for him?"

He didn't sound too confident. Edelgard really had taken the wind out of this kid's sails and left him a moping mess. And after he had worked up the courage to come here by himself and introduce himself with the utmost confidence! She would need to work on getting him back to himself.

Byleth let out a long exhale. "Edelgard, you stay here-" because you obviously don't care about anything besides your book- "Dimitri, come with me."

Dimitri all but jumped to his feet. "Okay!"

Byleth almost felt a surge of whiplash at how fast he had perked up. He was painfully anxious and unconfident until he received any kind of positive reinforcement. It seemed that, as long as she kept Edelgard from slathering the boy with mean comments, he would be the most well-behaved and tolerable.

Edelgard hardly gave a response that she had heard Byleth, but she took Dimitri with her without a second glance. The girl wasn't running away anytime soon, that was for sure. Besides, this would get Dimitri away from Edelgard, and it was important to find Claude.

"Huh." The teenager cupped her elbow with her hand and put her other hand to her chin in a thoughtful look. Dimitri seemed to like theatrics, so she would play into this a little. "I wonder where Sir Claude has gone?"

She looked down at Dimitri, who seemed confused at her language. She decided to really get into character. She knelt down - still ending up slightly taller than him - and held out her hand to him. "Prince Dimitri Adrien Bracehelm-"

Dimitri's smile fell. "It's Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd-"

Byleth refound her vigor. "Prince Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd! Your fellow countryman is lost! What shall we do?"

The boy's face lit up, as though Byleth had not fumbled his ridiculously long name. "We have to find him! What if he's being attacked by monsters?"