"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Where do you think you're going?" Hiccup asked, chasing after Toothless, letting Astrid run off. Tying his bag to Toothless, Hiccup mounted the reptile, readying himself for the journey to come. Taking off, the heir of Berk flew away without looking back. Hiccup had no remorse in leaving his home, planning to never come back.
One year later.
The snow blanketed the ground in its cold embrace that morning. The sun peaked over the waves, quietly brightening the slumbering village. The buildings, built to stand against even worse, stood strong beneath the snow, columns of smoke billowing out from many of their chimneys. It was a quiet morning, permeated with peace and tranquility. That had become the standard since he had left. No more crazy contraptions, no wild ideas. Just quiet Berk.
...
When she ran away, Astrid ran back to the village and told everyone what Hiccup had done. The village, led by a saddened Stoick, rampaged back down to the cove screaming for his head. Yet when they finally got there, both he and his dragon were nowhere to be seen.
"The little runt must have ran away, that little coward!" Spitelout sneered. "He was never fit to be called a Viking!"
"Everyone back to the village," Stoick commanded, ignoring his brother, "Hiccup is gone."
...
Then she awoke. She slowly sat up, stretching out her arms, then brushing her golden hair out of her vision. Then she remembered. Today was the day he disappeared. Exactly two years ago. And nothing was ever the same. After he left, Astrid couldn't bring herself to kill his, now her, dragon to finish training. So instead, the Savior of Berk, future Chieftain Snotlout swept in and crushed the monstrous nightmare's skull, putting one of its broken teeth to put on a necklace as a trophy.
Last year was tough for her too. Despite being gone for a year, there were still tattoos of Hiccups time in the village. Buildings were scarred from some of his failed inventions, burn marks from others on the unmarred. She visited his little workshop that day, one year later, to find it completely untouched. Gobber had neither the heart, nor the will, to change a thing. Quickly the place became both her and Gobber's place of remembrance for the young boy. A year after his leave, the pair took down a design he had labeled 'promising' and built it, just to remember him, what he was like. The thing was, it worked, and he wasn't there to see it.
Still, two years later, Astrid missed Hiccup. His quirky movements and his dorky attitude meant that being around him was never boring. But she was the one that let him leave. More like forced him to leave. If it was not for her imprudent views on dragons, he might have actually been able to convince her they were what he said. Instead, she just yelled at him and left. And she would never forgive herself.
Yet there was a silver lining to his departure from the island. Berk had an entire dragon free season to build up their reserves for when they did come back. Everyone thought they would. Everybody started to blame Hiccup for the attacks. Now since he was gone, not a single dragon was seen, let alone killed. Finally, the village heard the beating wings of its greatest foes, and they prepared for the coming attack. Preparing for a horde, they were surprised when it was only one minor attack. Only two houses caught on fire, and neither burned down. No one even died. No one suffered injury- not a bruised wrist, a sore arm- nothing. After that, they had an entire six months to continue to build up their reserves, train with their weapons, and prep for the next attack. It seemed like it would never come.
As time passed, the tense feeling everyone had in Berk began to subside. People began to spend more time improving their craft, caring less and less about their ability to fight. As for the teens, Snotlout got ever bolder, asking Astrid out more and more frequently, once even bringing up a marriage contract. But all this tended to bring him was the usual bruise, every once in a while a sprain, and on one rainy afternoon a broken arm. Mentally, Fishlegs grew more patient, more intelligent, and even more reserved. Physically, the once pudgy child began to grow into a powerfully built man, beginning to rival Stoick and Spitelout in both size and strength. The twins pledged themselves to Loki's service, a feat that left most of the village ducking for cover. With their new quest to please their 'master' as they called him, they came up with even more destructive pranks than ever before. That didn't last though, as the village isolated the pair from any item that could potentially be used in a prank. It got to the point that the twins were barely being fed out of the fear of what they would do with the food.
As for Astrid- she changed the most. Even quieter than before, the once proud warrior barely swung her axe anymore. While the village congratulated her on chasing away the nuisance Hiccup, she could barely live with her guilt. So instead of continuing her training to become a shield maiden, she journeyed out on her own. So she sharpened her hunting skills. In fact, she became the best hunter the island had ever seen- yet no one ever saw her hunt. She only hunted alone. Yet she came back with more killed game in one day than the rest came back with in a week. By a few days after the two year 'anniversary' of Hiccup's departure, the village's festivities and Astrid's solemn requiem the feelings once again began to subside to a dull gesture.
Like three days before, the sun rose over the snow covered village, with peace and tranquility reigning supreme, Astrid rose. Yet today was different. By sundown, the peace was gone- the siege had begun. Every night, right at sundown, the monsters came. Hundreds, maybe even thousands fell upon the village like rain. By dawn of the first night of fighting, not a single building was left standing. That day, those who survived dragged themselves to the forest where they attacked the trees, quickly and effectively hewn them into homes. The village being quickly rebuilt, the warriors bedded down to gather their strength for the coming night.
As per the night before, the winged demons came a dusk like a raging tempest. Roaring through the island, the dragons fought as a swirling mass of scale and fire. But to answer the Vikings became something beyond themselves- a fortress of shield, a spear of survival. Led by Chief Stoick the Vast, his hammer wildly swinging, downing a flying reptile with every swing. Never faulting, never giving quarter, the Vikings rallied around him, a solid cliff in the storm. Yet all the same, the dragons never faltered, never gave quarter, and fought rock and steel with fire and claw. One white dragon, larger than the rest, fought more bravely and more savagery than the rest, causing many to gather to him too. Seemingly, as quickly as the night had begun, the sun began its climb over the horizon, eliciting a retreat by the dragons, the last of which left the ground with the last of the sun finishing its crawl past the horizon.
The third day no houses where rebuilt, only catapults, and traps, and walls. Eight large catapults where built in a semicircle around the entrance to the Great Hall, all pointed at various angles away from the structure. Beyond them, near two dozen traps where laid in the hopes that no dragon would be able to pass them. And beyond the massive doors to the Great Hall, beyond the large defensive catapults, beyond the field of traps lay the Wall. Standing over thirty five feet tall and over nine feet thick, constructed of only the best stone and timber, the Wall of Berk was a monument to Viking ingenuity. On the third day, no man rested. After the defenses were assembled, they moved to refining their armor, sharpening their swords, smithing more axes. This siege was no longer just another dragon attack. It was a war.
The third night, it seemed it was going to be even worse. The decision to forego sleep and continue preparation was seen as a mistake to all in hindsight. On top of that, those who were chosen to man the Wall and load the catapults noticed that there seemed to be impossibly more dragons than even the night before. As the dragons drew ever closer, the Vikings also noticed that many of the dragons before them had never been seen by those of Berk, dragons from much farther south. And as the dragons flew above what was left of the village, the defenders sky was filled with an endless horde of dragons. Vibrant blues, reds, greens, and yellows filled the sky before the dragons began to set down about fifty yards beyond the wall. After what seemed like hours, the beast army before them filled all of the land between the shore and the wall, as well as much of the airspace above the defenses, all peering anxiously at Stoick the Vast, leader of the Berkian defenders, as he stood vigil at the center of the wall resolute in the defense of his village.
Suddenly, the mass of dragons began to separate, leaving the one larger white dragon in the center of the aisle. It slowly began to walk forward to the front line where it stopped. Pausing for a moment, all was still. Then suddenly its mouth opened, slightly inhaling to release a bolt of fire. Then faintly, a noise was heard. A whistling sound, not unlike a...
"Night Fury!" One of the defenders yelled, "Get down!"
Those who did not heed the warning watched a blinding plasma blast slammed right into the white dragon's snout, throwing it into a forward roll, straight into the wall. All heads, human and reptile alike flew upward to see the bat-like creature circling high above. Then a blood curdling screech filled the air, causing the dragons to break into chaos. The solid mass of dragon broke in a single instant, with every single one heading in a different direction. Some took to the air, calling upon their fire to attack the nearby Vikings, while some, petrified, simply ran into the woods, while others still jumped into the ocean and began trying to swim away. In response to the mayhem, the Vikings began to do what they were born to do- kill dragons. Anything that came close to being within arm's length was swung at, with devastating results. The winged reptiles fell from the sky like it was raining dragons, many dead before they even touched the ground.
Yet as quickly as the stunned dragons' attack had begun, the battle came to a halt as a second plasma blast slammed into the center of the battlefield, causing both dragons and Vikings, to stop fighting. Looking up, they saw the Night Fury, with one tail colored white, now hovering near vertically only a few meters above the now paused battle. Its roar once again ripped through the night, creating a mass exodus of dragons, of every shape and size, to turn tail and get away from the village and the feared black demon as quickly as possible. The Vikings on the other hand, being much more stubborn, began to adjust their catapults to down the offspring of lightning and death. Yet they never got a chance to shoot because it plummeted to the ground before its wings violently snapped open, causing the beast to come to a sudden stop on the battlements adorning the top of the wall. Only then did the defenders of Berk realize that this dragon was something special. Not only was it the offspring of lightning and death, the most feared reptile of the Nordic world, but it also possessed something they did not expect.
The Night Fury had a saddled rider on its back.