Toothless saw the problem about the same time Stoick did. The problem, of course, being that Vikings loved to fight, and Dragons loved to fight, too. For seven (human) generations, each side had had a convenient outlet for such violent urges, but now the war was at an end. So what to do with all this extra blood-thirstiness? Fight amongst themselves, apparently. Add that to the fact that the village's sheep flock was still sorely depleted from the last raid, and that even without having to feed the Queen, dragons still ate quite a bit, and it didn't take Hiccup to see that the peace was doomed before it began.

Oddly (or so Stoick thought), it was Toothless who found the answer. Or rather, a Monstrous Nightmare found the answer, but Toothless was the one who stole it and brought the answer to Stoick. The answer being a rather gnawed-upon cow, and Stoick being in the middle of the village, Toothless did not get the response he had hoped for.

"When did you trade a dragon for a cat, Hiccup," drawled Stoick, "and why is it dancing at us?" Hiccup, being a bit more fluent in Toothless than his father, chose to forgo a response in favor of paying attention. Toothless was indicating the cow, then pointing out over the sea.

"Dad, what is that?"

"A cow, or what's left of one. Shame the dragon spit makes it poisonous."

Hiccup refrained from bringing up a certain fish tail. "One of our cows?"

"No, we don't have cows, and you know that, boy -" Stoic understood, too.

"So it's someone else's cow. And how far away is the nearest village with cows?"

"Four days by ship, if we have a good wind."

"This cow looks like it was alive yesterday."

"Yes. It does." Stoic wrapped one meaty arm around Spitelout's shoulder and the other around Gobber, and hustled his lieutenant and friend off toward the longhouse.

A week later, the first expedition of the Island of Berk's Dragon-Riding Dragonslayer Vikings were ready to go a-viking.

A/N: seriously, this was my biggest thought at the end of the movie: "Dragon-riding Vikings? Oh dear people of Britain (and pretty much any place near Europe or Newfoundland, or with a coast) hide your children now!"

A/N #2: This was written 5 May, 2010. Just now got to cross-posting it to FFnet.