Right, um... all the rights belong to dreamworks, and any other parties involved. I just thought I'd try my hand at this. Enjoy!

Chapter One: In Which I Fuck Up Once Again

Berk. My village. In a word: sturdy. It's been here for seven generations, but every single building is new. We have fishing, hunting, and a charming view of the sunsets. The only problems are the pests.

You see, most places have mice or mosquitoes. We have dragons.

Most people would leave. Not us. We're vikings. We have stubbornness issues, something my boss and my father never let me forget. I know what they would say now.

Get back inside, Hiccup!

But dad, the door is on fucking fire, I would reply. But he wouldn't hear me, and I would ignore his instructions anyway. I'm not exactly supposed to be out during a dragon raid. I tend to mess things up and make life infinitely more difficult for the other vikings, so they tell me to keep inside.

"Wha're you doing? Get inside!" someone hisses at me as they rush past.

"Get back inside," a woman tells me somewhat petulantly. I run past the guard, who is too busy examining whatever gross unhygienic shit he pulled out of his ear to notice me.

I run towards the shop, where I know I've stored my net launcher. I gotta catch a dragon. Catch it, and kill it, to regain my honour.

Come on, come on, come on. Get to the shop before the damn attack is over, I tell myself.

"Hiccup!" Someone pulls me backwards, and I feel the heat of dragon fire burn the air in front of me. The earth suddenly disappears from under my feet, and as I turn to thank whoever it is who saved me and to ask them to put me the fuck back down, I'm met with the stony, stormy expression on my dad's face.

Oh, shit.

"What is he doing out agai-" he stops himself and turns to me. "What are you doing out?" I open my mouth to answer, but he gets to it first. "Get inside." He shoves me away impatiently, like he has more important things to deal with. Which… I guess he does.

"'I'm Stoick the Vast! I ripped the head off of a dragon when I was a wee babe,'" I mutter under my breath as I walk into the shop.

Gobber, my boss and the owner of the shop, looks up at me.

"Oh, nice of you to join the party!" he says sarcastically. He's in the middle of hammering a twisted blade back into shape. I stare at the stump at the end of his left arm, and at the hammer he's attached to it for now, and I wonder, not for the first time, how many hands he's made for himself.

"I thought you'd been carried off," he remarks.

"Who, me?" I tie my leather working apron behind my back. "Naw, come on, I'm waaaay too muscular for their taste." I grunt as I pick up a stone hammer that has been thrown on the ground and set it back in its place. It's heavy enough that I need two hands to lift it, but I've long since stopped worrying about my pride around Gobber. I've been his apprentice since I was little, or littler, so he's been there to witness all my failures and the small number of successes I've had in my life. "They wouldn't know what to do with all this," I gesture to myself ironically.

"Ah, well they need toothpicks, don't they?" he says, switching his hammer hand for a set of pliers. I roll my eyes, but I'm smiling. Someone drops damaged equipment off at the front, and I rush to bring them back to the forge, setting them on the fire and stocking it so that Gobber can bend them back into shape with his interchangeable left hand. In the distance, I see yet another house burn to the ground, and I wonder who my dad will enlist to rebuild it this time.

I set the dented-now-repaired sword Gobber was working on earlier on the counter for some viking to use, and I catch a glimpse of the other teenaged vikings. They're stronger than me, and they don't fuck things up on a regular basis, so they're allowed to do something on the battle field. Even such a small job as setting out fires like they do is entirely out of bounds for me.

Fishlegs, Snotlout, Ruff and Tuffnut, and Astrid. All of them only carrying buckets of water and still managing to look five times more impressive than I do.

Oh, their job is so much cooler. I make to scramble over the counter we have in the front of the shop, ready to go out and kill something, but Gobber grabs me first.

"Eh!" he says, grabbing my collar with the pliers.

"Oh. come on. Let me out, please? I need to make my mark," I say. He's holding me above the ground, and I slump at the reminder of how small I am.

"Oh, you've made plenty of marks; all in the wrong places," he says, poking my chest with the pliers for emphasis.

"Please, two minutes. I'll kill a dragon, my life will get infinitely better," I pause. "I might even get a date!" I gesture outside, in the general direction of Astrid. Odin knows, I'd never get a date with her regardless of whether I kill a dragon or not, but a guy can dream.

"You can't lift a hammer, you can't swing an axe, you can't even throw one of these!" He picks up a set of bolas, and someone grabs them from him and throws them at a dragon, twisting its legs with the rope.

"Ok, fine," I say, backing up. "But this will throw it for me." I pat the machine I've built to throw a multitude of dragon-catching devices. and, of course, because the gods hate me, the machine throws a net directly into the face of a very surprised viking. His helmet flies off his head and he falls backwards with a thud. Gobber sighs irritatedly.

"See, now this right here is what I'm talking about."

"It's a mild...calibration issue," I stammer.

"No, no, Hiccup." Gobber raises a hand to stop me and points his pliers at me. "If you ever want to get out there to fight dragons, you need to stop all…" he searches for a word, "this," he gestures towards me. I look down at myself.

"But you just pointed to all of me," I say with a roll of my shoulders.

"Yes," he says proudly, sticking me in the shoulder with his real hand. "That's it. Stop being all of you."

"Ohh," I say threateningly.

"Oh, yeah," Gobber says, staring me down. I point a finger at him in warning.

"You, sir, are playing a dangerous game. Keeping this much… raw… vikingness contained! There will be consequences!" I warn him.

"I'll take my chances. Sword. Sharpen. Now." He dumps a sword into my arms. I sag under its weight, and carry it over to the whetstone, pressing the blade to the spinning rock. Sparks fly from the sword, and I squint my eyes, hoping against hope that none of them will get into my eyes.

I doubt an eyepatch would make me look any more threatening, I think to myself. One day, I'll get out there. Because killing a dragon is everything around here.

A Nadderhead is sure to at least get me noticed. Gronckles are tough. Taking down one of those would definitely get me a girlfriend. A Zippleback? Exotic. Two heads, twice the status. And then, there's the monstrous Nightmare. Only the best vikings go after those. They have this nasty habit of setting themselves on fire.

But the ultimate prize is the dragon no one's ever seen: we call it the -

"Night Fury!" someone screams.

"Get down!" someone else shouts. A tower explodes behind them, and my dad comes flying from the top, fire blowing up behind him.

This dragon never steals food, never shows itself, and never misses.

Another tower explodes, and a streak of black flies away from it.

No one has ever killed a Night Fury; that's why I'm gonna be the first.

A crash sounds outside and Gobber runs to the window, watching fire and rubble streak down from the sky. He unscrews the pliers from his hand, and replaces them with a battle axe.

"Man the fort, Hiccup. They need me out there." He stalks towards the shop's entrance, and suddenly whirls around and points at me. "Stay. Put. There." A pause. "You know what I mean." And then he rushed off, shouting a battle cry. I watch him go. As soon as I can't see him, I rush to the back of my shop and wheel my machine out as fast as I can. I rattle past the people outside waiting to get their swords sharpened or something.

"Hiccup!"

"Sorry!" I yell back.

"Where are you going?"

"Yeah, I know, I'll be right back." I run past my dad, who is wrangling a Nadderhead and winning. All in a day's work for the chieftain.

I get to the edge of our village, a small piece of land hanging over the sea, and set up my machine. I stare through the sight, looking for something to shoot.

"Come on, gimme something to shoot at, gimme something to shoot at," I mumble. A dragon roars, and I hear a whirring sound. That can only be the sound of a Night Fury's wings slicing through the air. I adjust my grip on the wood.

Something black moves, and i only see it because it hides the stars, but it looks distinctly dragon-shaped. I stare at it through the sight, and try to time my shot right. A tower explodes in blue fire, and I chase the black shape that flies away from it with my machine.

I hold my breath and shoot. The recoil sends me flying back, and i scramble to get up, to see if I actually shot that thing. I'm not disappointed.

I hear the roar of a dragon as it goes down, trees snapping under its weight.

"Oh, I hit it," I say to myself disbelievingly. I jump up, arms flying upwards in victory. "Yes, I hit it!" I whirl around, looking for an audience. "Did anybody see that?" A growl makes the air vibrate around me, and I turn to see a Nightmare crawling up the hill behind me. My arms fall to my sides, and fear tightens in my chest, along with the stomach dropping feeling of disappointment. "Except for you." The dragon stares at me, and I run.

"Ah!" I hear the dragon chasing me, like this is some sort of game of tag. Gods, just make it go away, i really don't wanna die yet. I get back into the village and slip making a turn. The dragon shoots fire over my head, hitting a stone wall. I hide behind the first pole I can find: it's a torch, the thick wooden base just wide enough to hide me from view. I gasp as I hear the dragon shoot a stream of fire at the pole, and keep my arms close to my chest as I feel the pole burn behind me.

I look around the pole to see if the dragon is still there, and I feel something breathe down my neck. I swallow, and turn to face the Nightmare on the other side. Before I can even let out a shout of panic, a red blur flies at the dragon, throwing itself onto its snout. They both go rolling away.

The blur stands up, and I see that it is, in fact, my father. Of course, Why does that not surprise me?

The Nightmare tries to shoot fire at my dad, but only manages a small mouthful. It burps pitifully.

"You're all out," my father growls. He leaps at the dragon, punching it under its chin, hitting it until it cowers and flies away. He turns to face me, eyes burning in anger. The pole that was hiding me crashes, and I wince. The burning part of the torch rolls away, wreaking all sorts of havoc and making all sorts of noise down in the lower parts of the village.

"Sorry, Dad." The torch rolls over the dragons my dad had trapped earlier, and they shake their nets free. I watch helplessly as they fly off with some of our sheep. Everyone has gathered in a circle, and i can feel dozens of pairs of angry viking eyes staring me down.

"Ok, but i hit a Night Fury," I try. "Ah!" My dad grabs me by my collar and pulls me away. "It's not like the last few times, Dad! I - I - I really actually hit it. You guys were busy, and I had a very clear shot. It went down just off Raven Point. Let's get a search party-"

"Stop! Just… stop. Every time you step outside, disaster follows. Can you not see I have bigger problems? Winter is almost here and I have an entire village to feed!" he yells. I look around and lean in a bit.

"I mean, between you and me, the village could do with a little less feeding, don;t you think?"

"This isn't a joke, Hiccup! Why can't you follow the simplest orders?"

"I - I - I - I can't stop myself! I see a dragon and I have to just…" I twist my arms, showing how I would snap a dragon's neck, "kill it, you know? It's who I am, Dad." My dad groans and rubs his temple.

"Oh, you're many things, Hiccup. But a dragon killer is not one of them." I sigh. "Get back to the house. Make sure he gets there," he says louder, nodding to Gobber. Gobber walks towards me and cuffs me on the back of my head. I can't find it in me to rise to his provocation. "I have his mess to clean up."

Upon hearing those words, my heart sinks a little more. Great job, Hiccup.

As Gobber escorts me back to my house, I hear Ruffnut chortling at me.

"Quite the performance," her twin sneers.

"I've never seen anyone mess up so badly," Snotlout adds. "That helped!"

"Thank you, thank you, I was trying," I say. Astrid examines her axe disinterestedly. Wow, I can't even get a reaction from her. I shot down a fucking Night Fury, and she still won't look at me.

I hear Gobber shove Snotlout behind me, and I can't help but feel a bit better.

"I really did hit one," I tell him as we come up to the house.

"Sure, Hiccup," he humours me.

"He never listens."

"Runs in the family."

"-and, and when he does, it's always with this disappointed scowl, like someone skimped on the meat in his sandwich." I puff my chest and adopt my dad's accent. "'Excuse me, barmaid. I'm afraid you brought me the wrong offspring. I ordered an extra large boy with beefy arms, extra guts and glory on the side. This here, this is a talking fishbone!'"

"Now, you're thinking about this all wrong. It's not so much what you look like, it's what's inside that he can't stand." A beat.

"Thank you, for summing that up." I turn to go into the house.

"Look, the point it, stop trying so hard to be something you're not."

"I just wanna be one of you guys," I say. I walk into the house, and Gobber sighs behind me.

I shut the door behind me and race through the house, running out through the back door. Gotta find that dragon.

Back in the great hall, all of the viking warriors had gathered. Stoick the Vast, chieftain of the town of Berk, had issued a meeting. He glared down at the map of the nearby ocean and then up at the warriors.

"Either we finish them, or they finish us. It's the only way we'll be rid of them," he exclaims. "If we find the nest and destroy it, the dragons will leave. They'll find another home!" He stabs a corner drawn over with in swirling mist. The dragons' nest was somewhere in there, and they would find it. Stoick would find it, if it was the last thing he did. He had a personal score to settle with the dragons.

"One more search, before the ice sets in."

"Those ships never come back," someone protests.

"We're vikings," he says. "It's an occupational hazard! Now, who's with me?" There is a small murmur of doubt, and Stoick leans away from the table, a spark of mischief in his eyes. "Alright. Those who stay will look after Hiccup." Immediately, there was an enthusiastic cry. Stoick nodded in satisfaction, but he wasn't sure he should be proud that he'd used taking care of his son as an ultimatum and convinced so many vikings to do his bidding. Surely, Hiccup wasn't that bad when not messing things up?

"Aye, that's more like it." The room clears, and Stoick moves towards Gobber, who is taking a swig from the tankard he has replaced his left hand with.

"Right," Gobber says, tapping the table with his tankard. "I'll pack my undies."

"No, I need you to stay and train some new recruits," Stoick says.

"Oh, perfect. And while I'm busy, Hiccup can cover the stall. Molten steel, razor-sharp blades, lots of time to himself. What could possibly go wrong?" Gobber says ironically. He takes a swig from his hand. Stoick groans.

"Urgh, what am I going to do with him, Gobber?"

"Put him in training."

"No, I'm serious," Stoick says a bit louder.

"So am I!"

"He'd be killed before you let the first dragon out of its cage."

"Oh, you don't know that," Gobber waves a hand dismissively.

"I do, actually," Stoick protests.

"No, you don't."

"No. I do."

"No, you don't!"

"Listen, you know what he's like." Stoick gets up and paces nervously. "From the time he could crawl he's been… doesn't listen, he has the attention span of a sparrow." Gobber chokes a bit on his mead, and his false tooth falls into his cup. "I take him fishing, and he goes hunting for - for trolls!" Gobber whirls around and points his tankard at Stoick.

"Trolls exist! They steal your socks. But only the left ones, what's with that?" He drinks again.

"When I was a boy-" Stoick begins.

"Oh, here we go."

"-my father told me to bang my head against a rock, and I did it!" Gobber fished through his tankard to find his tooth. "I thought it was crazy, but I didn't question him. And you know what happened?"

"You got a headache," Gobber says, hammering his tooth back into place with the bottom of his cup.

"That rock split in two. It taught me what a viking could do, Gobber. He could - he could crush mountains, level forests, tame seas!"He gesticulates wildly to emphasize his point. "Even as a boy, I knew what I was, what I had to become. Hiccup is not that boy." Stoick shakes his head despairingly. Well, he's obviously not that boy. He's not you, Stoick, Gobber thinks, much as you'd like him to be.

"You can't stop him, Stoick. You can only prepare him. I know it seems hopeless, but the truth is you won't always be around to protect him. He's going to get out there again. He's probably out there now."

I scratch another mark unto my notebook, marking another place where the dragon is not. I sigh in frustration.

"Urgh!" I scratch black lines all over my map, and close my notebook, tucking it into its place in a pocket in my vest.

"Oh, the gods hate me. Some people lose their knife, or a mug. No, not me. I manage to lose and entire dragon!" I swipe a branch out of my way spitefully, and it whips back into my face.

"Oh, fuck! Thor's hammer, that hurt like a bitch, argh!" I rub my eye and look up at the tree. Its trunk is snapped in two, and a trail of broken trees and a dent in the earth follow it. My breath catches in excitement.

Is it the dragon?

I scramble down the path, sidestepping roots and fallen branches, trying my hardest not to die.

The land sloped upwards, and as I come to the top of the hill, my heart stutters and I gasp loudly.

Because right there, not so far from where I stand, is a dragon. I duck down to the earth as fast as I can, praying that it hasn't seen me, or, even better, that it's dead. Oh, gods, please let it be dead.

I carefully look over the hill's crest, and it's still there. Not a figment of my imagination, or a product of some of the strange-smelling smoke that comes from some of the village torches, but real. Tangible. A sleek looking, black dragon, its wings and legs tangled in a mess of rope.

I quickly feel for my knife and hold it out in front of me with both hands, my breath still coming much too fast.

I sneak up to the dragon, hiding behind rocks and my knife. When I approach it, it doesn't move. Oh, thank Hel, it's dead.

"Oh, wow. I - I… I did it! Ohhh, I did it! This, this… this fixes everything! Yes!" I bring one foot onto the dragon's flank. "I have brought down this mighty beast!" Suddenly, the creature beneath me shrugs me off with a roar, and I jump backwards, heart startled into fluttering at dangerous speeds again.

I press my back against a rock and try to catch my breath. I hold my knife out in front of me and approach the dragon again. I can hear the deep sound of its breath now, and see the rise and fall of its sides. My eyes scan the dragon: its tail is twisted with rope, its legs are gently moving in time with its breathing, and its wings strain against the pressure of the rope.

A single green eye stares me down, a slit of black pupil trained on me and my movements.

I look away from its eye, and point my knife where its heart would be. I glance at its eye again as it lets out a pitiful grunt. My arms shake with guilt about what I'll soon do. I exhale slowly, and tear my eyes from his.

"I'm gonna kill you, dragon. Then I'll cut out your heart and take it to my father." I adjust my grip on my knife, and point it down to the dragon's heart. "I am a viking," I whisper. Wow, that was pathetic. "I am a viking!" I roar at it. The dragon groans again. I close my eyes against the sight of his scared green eye and lift my knife over my head. My breath is coming in pants, and my heart is thundering in my chest.

Against my better judgement, I open my eyes. I see the dragon looking at me fearfully, and I shut them again. The dragon moans sadly, and I open my eyes to see his head laid on the ground, eye shut in resignation.

I let out a deep breath, and let my arms fall downwards, letting them hit my head.

"Urgh!" I groan. I can't do it, I can't fucking do it. First viking ever too scared to kill an immobilised dragon. Pathetic. But as I look down at his trapped limbs, I feel even worse.

"I did this," I say softly. I turn to leave, but an idea suddenly hits me. An idea that stems mostly from guilt, but that only makes it more powerful.

Before I can change my mind, I set to slicing through the ropes. As soon as the ropes loosen enough, the dragon jumps up, one of its paws pressed to my neck, my head leaning back against a rock. I feel the dragon's deep growl in the beating of my heart, feel his searing eyes stare at me angrily.

Oh, gods, this is it. This is the end. It's close enough that I can see individual scales on its head, and the dust that lines the space between them. His nostrils flare with each breath, and I would almost be reminded of a rabbit, but that would be crazy.

The dragon opens its mouth slowly, and I shut my eyes, praying that a fiery death is not as painful as it sounds. I feel the weight of his paw lift off of my neck, and he stamps it down into the ground beside my head. A head-splitting growl comes out of his mouth, and a rush of hot air hits my face. Suddenly, the heat is gone, and I see the dragon leap away, seemingly out of balance, and fall into one the valley below.

I feel my chest, feel my heart beating erratically under my fingers. But I'm alive. Oh, thank Yggdrasil, I'm alive.

I breathe for a moment, and then get up on shaky legs. My ears ring, and the world spins around me. My legs give out, and with a broken, too-high noise, I slip to the floor, knife sliding out of my grip, and the world goes black.