AN: Hello people! I bet none of you expected to see HTBADC's sequel up this year. This year uni will be even tougher, so I will already state that it is highly unlikely that I'll be able to regularly update this story. I will try, however to keep them coming at a consistent rate. I hope you all enjoy it. This chapter takes place briefly after he awakes, and before the first episode of Riders of Berk.

New speech format:

'hohoho' = Thought

"hohoho" = speech

'hohoho' = Windwalker mind speech

'hohoho' = stressed word, indicating urgency or importancy.

Without further ado:

"Hiccup! We need your help. A Gronckle and a Nadder are almost fighting one another."

"Hiccup! Get this Terror away from my pies!"

"Hiccup! I don't like how this Nightmare is eyeing my sheep!"

"Hiccup! Yeh need to take it slow!"

"Hiccup…"

"Hiccup…!"

"HICCUP!"

His legs threatened to give out, especially the one with the prosthesis. He was soaked right to the bones in tiredness. Consciousness kept flickering in and out, and his vision blackened and returned constantly.

He was almost home…

His half leg bucked. He closed his half-shut eyes, ready for the fall. He was already imagining what his father would say… finding him lying down just outside their home.

He would scowl at him. He would feel ashamed because of him.

He would be called useless again…

The ground never came. A pair of soft arms wrapped themselves around him as he heard a grunt bring whispered out of the person's mouth.

He recognized this mixed herbal smell…

"Hiccup? Hiccup?! I got you, I got you," Heather whispered against his ear. She lifted him up slightly and hugged him tightly. He returned it, though too weakly for Heather to dismiss it.

She stroke his scalp, the part right where his hair begins to grow on the back of his head. He melted in her embrace. She was the only one that knew that stroking this part of his head turned him into a puddle.

He sighed, thankful, thankful that she caught him, thankful of the caring attention. "Let's get you inside okay Hiccup?" He heard his name so many times this day and he was so tired of hearing it. But when she spoke his name he didn't feel tired. He felt safe.

She gently put his arm around her shoulders and took off the pressure on his half leg. He half sighed, half sobbed, relieved that his leg was no longer burdened by his weight.

No matter how small it may be.

Taking baby steps Heather walked him inside his house. It was night, and most people were still dining at the Great Hall, his father included.

He had been too, but decided to head home earlier. He felt so tired…

His eyes fluttered as he tried to keep them open. He wasn't feeling aware of his surroundings. He felt himself lying down, and could hear Heather speak to him.

With no small amount of effort he opened his eyes and looked at the raven-haired girl. "Here, drink a bit," she spoke softly. And so he did, while she helped him sit up a bit. After he was done, she let him lie down.

"I'll make you some soup." He grunted in protest, the words failing to come out of his mouth in an audible way. "No buts, I saw how little you ate back there." He huffed, though he couldn't bring himself to be annoyed.

He heard some metal clanking, and them the hearth near him became warm; she had lit it. There was a moment of silence before he felt her presence, right beside him. "Don't feel pitiful or ashamed of yourself," she told him while holding his hand. "It's okay to get tired. You've been working hard lately."

She knew him well, so well. Her words, full of concern and care stopped his self-depreciation. She was right, may be has been working hard. But he couldn't have done it any other way. The dragons looked up at him, the people of Berk looked up at him. He needed to be there to help integrate these two words.

He made a move to stand up but soft hands gently pushed him down. He felt weak, and he knew his friend barely put any force to keep him lying down. "Shush now dear. Rest a bit." She left again, and he could hear something being chopped. Vegetables most likely.

He didn't try to get up again. He kept lying down, eyes shut as he concentrated on his hearing. He felt someone nudge his hand, and he knew instantly that it was Toothless. "It's okay bud…" His voice felt weird, strange even. It came out hoarse and weak. "I just need to rest a bit…"

The chopping stopped, but he could hear the water boiling on the cauldron. She came back to his side again. "It'll be ready soon," she whispered while caressing his cheek. She then turned to Toothless and scratched his chain. "Would you keep watch of the door? He needs to rest."

The dragon nudge him again then moved to a nearby corner, where he could both look at his rider and at the door.

The household had been rebuilt, and now it was much larger to accommodate the two furies. An incident with the twins and their Zippleback had left a giant hole on the left side of the house. And since Stoick was feeling that the place was too crowded he decided to demolish it and build a bigger one from scratch, rather than repair and later expand it.

It was now as big as a storehouse. If the chief's home had been big in the past it was enormous now. The layout was still the same, except that Hiccup's door was large enough for the dragons to pass through with ease, as was the stairs leading to his room.

Perhaps the biggest change was in his room. It had now two floor stones, one for Toothless and one for Windwalker. Their habit of lighting up the ground before lying down had caused an incident more than once. One time Toothless overdid it, because of the winter, and Stoick ended up in a foul mood because of a lack of sleep and a bump on his head caused by a chunk of Hiccup's wooden floor that fell on his head.

On the same day, he appeared with two big flat stones, larger than him, and set it on his son's room. There never was an incident again.

'I see he is finally home,' the deep voice he became used to spoke. Windwalker quietly walked down the stairs, his eyes fixed on his boy. 'I wonder how you managed to drag him in.'

"I didn't." Her tone always became slightly icy when talking to Windwalker. It wasn't as full of enmity as his father's tone was when talking to the white one, but he could still detect it.

He wasn't sure it was there. Maybe it was jealousy. Maybe it was his disregard to the Vikings around him.

"He collapsed on me-would have collapsed on the ground if I had not picked him up. Toothless was excessively tired to react quickly. I wondered where you were that moment."

The white one hummed, which was weird. It came out as a deep rumbling and it was oddly comforting. 'I was here. I figured I'd cause less trouble, trouble that he would have to settle, if I remained here after mid-afternoon.'

He knew Windwalker had given a good reply because Heather said nothing. He couldn't understand their conversation more or less. The words were muffled, and he didn't think it was their fault.

Again he felt her come to him. "It's ready, I need you to sit up." She put the bowl on the bedtable to help him. She sat behind him and let him lean on her. Despite only being half-awake, he blushed. He had once been used to this, but lately he has been very self-conscious.

It didn't help that the two girls he was close to didn't see him as a mere friend.

Still, he wasn't going to let his self-consciousness get in the way.

"We'll take it slowly, otherwise it may upset your stomach." He opened his eyes just a bit so he could see the spoon. He felt childish enough by being fed, he didn't need to get himself dirty and feel even more so.

Sip by sip he ate the soup. He hummed in pleasure. Heather may not be a good at many things, like fighting, but she could cook better than most chiefs at the Hall.

After they were done, she put the bowl aside, but didn't leave. Instead, she wrapped her arms around him and started humming. It was a lullaby she knew, and he knew it because he heard her sing that tune many times when she had children sleeping at the healer's hut after a raid.

He felt sleep crawl up toward him, luring him toward it as softly as her humming was. Windwalker kept silent, watching the interaction. He knew when to be sarcastic and knew that joking that his boy was a toddler again wouldn't be appreciated.

She felt him relax around his arm, and his even breathing announced how he was asleep. Gently, and slowly, she slid off from behind him, and lied him down.

Slowly she took of his prosthesis and he felt him tense. A grunt came out of him, but he did not wake up. She could see why; the skin around his stump was reddish, no doubt irritated from the amount of stress put in it.

She walked back to the kitchen and came back with a cloth wet with warm water. Very carefully, she put it around the stump. He let out another grunt, but sighed shortly afterwards. She could feel his leg relax. She would let the warm cloth there for a bit. It would do him good.

"I will seriously have a talk with Stoick," she muttered, her tone showing no signs of amusement. As quietly as possible she cleaned up the dishes, while talking to Windwalker. "Seriously, I have never seen someone so daft. Everyone that has lost a limb know that they need to take easy during the recovery process. But Stoick? He just let Hiccup wear himself out. Even Gobber complained how the boy was trying to do too much too soon during their sessions."

'And do you honestly think he'll hear you?' she heard him ask. It was a question she asked herself, more than once. But she wasn't one to back down without a fight.

"You can bet he will," she muttered angrily. The white one snorted and she briefly glared at him. She knew he was going to take pleasure on seeing her scold the Chief. He may be the leader of Berk, but she was a healer, fresh out of her training. Concerning one's welfare, she was technically superior to him.

"Well, we'll see how well my status as healer will serve me tomorrow morning," she muttered, though to no one. Toothless didn't hear their talk, he was fast asleep. She looked at the dragon and sighed, he looked as worn out as his rider.

After she was done cleaning up she took the cloth off his leg then put a blanket over him. She then grabbed one for her-the advantages of being a chief's son: Hiccup had no small amount of blankets-and laid down on the couch.

As Windwalker climbed the stairs to go sleep, he could only think of one thing: Stoick was so in for it the next day…

He heard muffled voices as he slowly awoke. He felt much better, and this night's sleep had been better than all the ones he had had the prior two week to it.

" how can you be so…thick-headed?!" he heard one voice angrily exclaim. "I was very specific when I told you that he needed to rest and take it slow!"

"What do you want me to do?" He recognized the booming voice as his father's. No other voice could ever make his bed tremble, even if only slightly. "You know how he is better than everyone, probably better than even me." There was a hint of sorrow in these last words, almost undetectable.

"Yes I do. And so do you, which is why you should have kept an even closer eye on him."

"You ask me the impossible! I am the Chief, and now that we have the dragons-"

"We both know very well he has been handling the dragons, not you, not me, not any of the other dragon riders," she cur him out, then was a paused. He guessed that both were shocked that Heather just dared to cut the Chief. "I'm sorry Chief, I didn't…"

"Hush child," his tone was serene, almost sympathetic. "You speak the truth.…" He sounded much older, as if the truth made his age caught up with him. "I know you mean well… still, I don't know what to do. Unless I kept him locked here I don't know how to have him slow down."

Heather sighed, sharing his uncertainty. "Maybe if the teens regularly share their knowledge about the dragons that'll lessen the complains a bit. He can join up too. You'd only have to convince the people to have lessons about their beforetime mortal enemies given by a bunch of kids."

Stoick snorted, because it sounded absurd, but knew that she was onto something. "I think I can do that. But it won't be enough. The be-the dragons still act wildly, even when the teens are handling them. That's why they call him. He's the only one that has a way with these beasts…"

These words gave him a feeling of dejavu, but as quickly as it came it was gone. "He's no god, Chief. He learned how to do that, the same way he learned how to not see them as enemies. You can do it too. We all can."

There was a moment of silence.

"We know you're awake…" Heather said, making his breath hitch. He slowly sat up, and looked at them with eye still sleepy. "Feeling well rested?" He nodded, then gave her an appreciative smile.

"So…" It was rare of the Chief to be seen acting awkwardly, but he seemed to act so every time he was addressing Hiccup. "You probably heard us, so I think an apology is in order. I apologize for not keeping up my promise that I'd make up for all these years. You friend Heather suggested an idea that may benefit us all. You agree with it?"

He looked at her, and she was puzzled to see guilt hidden behind his eyes. 'Guilt of what?' she wondered.

"I think it's a good idea…"

And so they settled on using Heather's idea.