"Watch the waves! The water's getting rough!"
This shout came from the other end of the ship, but it was heard loud and clear. As if Stoick didn't know this already. The water was always rough in this area. Everyone in his tribe had warned against it, saying that the gods had cursed these waters and that so many Vikings had vanished already, they didn't need to lose their chief as well. But Stoick needed to go through this to get to the Trondheim fjord. It – or rather she who lived in it- held the answers for his tribe, how to get rid of these infernal dragons. She being the medicine lady of Norway, Helle, who knew everything, from magic to herbal cures to prophecies. Stoick had gone to her hoping that she could remove the dragons, or at least tell him how to remove them.
The dragons had been a problem ever since Hiccup had ended the age old war between the two. But what hadn't been counted on, although it probably should have, was that the dragons could be very mischievous. It should have been guessed because the dragons were able to defend and attack and generally take care of themselves during the war. After it was over, all their pent-up energy had to go somewhere, so it went into ruining Vikings' lives, which is what had started the war in the first place. It was a never ending circle, one that Stoick planned to fix once and for all by exterminating the dragons, and Toothless be damned.
The ship traveled bravely on, narrowly dodging rocks and other pieces of flotsam floating about.
"Blast it all! We'll never make it! Where is that gods-be-damned Helle anyways?" Some of the crew muttered assent, having already lost hope of ever arriving. After all, everybody said nobody ever returned for a reason. Stoick looked back. He heard what the men were saying, and a small part of him agreed. He decided to push on anyways. He'd give his life to make sure those foul creatures, those dragons, never existed again.
Stoick looked over the fjord. There was nothing to be seen through all these rough waters and hailing rain. He took one last look around before he changed the ship's course, to make sure he hadn't missed anything. That was when he saw it.
The other men on the ship were used to a tall, stern, quiet chief. So, needless to say, when he started jumping around for joy, they were quite surprised. Then they saw the light, that unearthly blue glow that told them they had arrived. Then they felt like jumping for joy too. They had survived! They could survive anything!
Stoick jumped to the ground after making sure that his ship was safely tied to the solitary pole that served as a moor. About half his crew followed, acting as his personal guard to make sure that their chief wasn't killed. They took wary steps towards the entrance of the cave in which the blue light was shining out of. About halfway in, they say a beautiful young woman walked in.
"Można zabrać peleryny strudzonych?" she asked. Most of the men didn't know a word of which she said, but the chief was well-versed, and knew that she said, 'can I take the weary travelers' cloaks?' However, Stoick didn't quite trust her.
"Amalja, Amalja, nie przejmuj się tych ludzi. Są to moje osobiste Goście." An older woman appeared out of the back of the cave and waved her off. The older woman turned to the men. "I am Helle. I am also very surprised you have made it here alive." She took a closer look at them. "Ah, but again, you are Vikings. You let nothing stand in your way. How am I to help you?"
"You already know of one reason I am here, to find a way to get rid of dragons," Said Stoick. "However, I am here for another reason as well. It is for this matter that I would wish to speak with you alone." Stoick turned to his men.
"BEGONE" He yelled to his men. This brought on many protests from his crew, for none of the men trusted Helle and put out the excuse that "we already know what you have to say to her." Stoick dismissed them. He turned back to Helle.
"My daughter, Hiccup, is ill. Anything we do does not help her, only makes it worse. The healers, even the ones who know everything, cannot help. She is dying. This is why I turn to you. I fear she may die, and soon, if we do not find a cure for her. Would you know of anything to help her?"
"This, I have the answer to," said Helle. "This disease is not unknown to me and rather easy to fix. I will have Amalja deliver the cure to your isle immediately."
"And why not I, seeing as I am her father?" Stoick asked.
"You don't really expect for me to do this for free, do you?" Helle practically laughed. "Everything comes with a price. Yours is banishment, a life for a life. For me to keep her alive, she will never see you again. It is only fair, no? Do not worry; it will get to your home."
Stoick hung his head. He could see her reasons, but wanted one way to find a loophole, one way to get out of it. Stoick could find none. Accepting fate was the only way to go, and if he attacked Helle, he'd never get what he needed. Go out quietly, and come back with an explosion worthy of the days of the herskerne av drager. He remembered his grandfather's dying words, and he agreed. So he accepted, and held out his hand.
Helle grasped his hand and chanted a few unintelligible words in an old, dead, language. The air around him seemed to swirl, and things started to darken. The last thing Stoick saw was his entire crew of over a hundred men rushing in. Then everything stopped. Space seemed to hold its breath as Stoick was moved along a pathway of some sorts. When this all ended, when Stoick was able to see again without falling over, he was in a different place. Different, but the same. What's more, his crew had followed him to… the entrance of Helle's cave?
Except, it wasn't. It was covered in moss and had vines hanging down, and it was in the middle of a forest, nowhere near a lake. It was the same cave for sure; Stoick could feel the residue magic left there. But how could this much change happen in a few minutes? A few of his crew stepped forward uneasily, accidentally snapping twigs but not caring. Stoick decided that he needed to be really far from this place to ever feel safe again. So he announced a conquest.
They had been walking for twenty and a half days, scrounging what they could. Even for the strongest of Vikings, this was torture. Most of his men were ready to drop like flies. Stoick finally felt like he was far enough away and they began to set up camp with the stuff they had entered this new world with. They weren't very quiet about it. After a few moments, they heard muttering, then a louder, clearer girl's voice.
"Hello? Is there ANYTHING out here?"
.:l-*-l:.
Everly hated these stupid camping trips her grandparents took her on every year. She and her twin sister, Kayeli, were brought along because it was "family bonding time" with the Geezers, but if she heard that excuse one more time, she would personally throw herself off the empire state building into a crowd of hungry bears while wearing a meat suit. The only thing that stopped her from going insane was Kayeli. They were as close as two peas in a pod, always doing everything together.
Right now she was listening to her iPod, using earbuds (obviously!) to share with Kayeli. They were driving on the gravelly back roads that led them to their –get this- log cabin! They were somewhere in Norway, not that Everly cared. The rental truck soon began slowing down to a stop, and Kayeli and Everly were booted out of the truck.
Grandma Gothi held out her hand. "Why don't you give your iPod to us, sugars, while you go explore around these caves and the forest? I hear there's some really neat stuff- no bears- and I'm sure you gals would love it! Don't forget bug spray!"
The girls reluctantly handed over their iPod and started racing off into the forest. When they got to a deep enough part where they were sure nobody would hear them, they started to talk and tease each other.
"I bet there are BEARS in here." Kayeli said.
"Did you even hear Grandma Gothi? Or are you so absorbed in your music that you go deaf?" Everly shot back.
They weren't actually fighting, contrary to mass belief. Many people thought they hated each other. They just never got a chance to bicker at home under their mother's harsh regime without getting punished, so they used every opportunity they got.
"You know Grandma was just saying 'no bears' in the sense that you shouldn't go looking for bears. In fact, maybe there's something worse. Maybe there are…" Kayeli paused for dramatic effect. "LAND SHARKS! You never know. You might find one. I heard that those crazy scientists down at University of Place are trying to make birds that breathe underwater, that way, when they poop, it won't land on any cars."
"Okay, now that's just gross," said Everly. "First of all, who cares about a bird poop epidemic? Secondly, who told you this? If it was Gustav again then, well, why do you ever believe him? That kid is a bag of lies! If you think there are bears or land sharks in here, I dare you to go find some!"
"I dare you!" Kayeli replied.
"I will!" With that, Everly turned and walked deeper into the forest with Kayeli following behind.
"I can't believe I let you talk me into this! There's probably nothing here, anyways," Everly muttered.
"Do you hear something? It sounds like snapping twigs." Kayeli said.
Everly turned. "Hello? Is there ANYTHING out here?" Everly spun around again to face her sister. "There's noth-"
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" A whole group of interestingly dressed people ran at them, screaming, from out of nowhere, carrying weapons that were illegal in many places.
"They must be maniacs." Whispered Kayeli into Everly's ear. However, these "maniacs" stopped dead when they saw the twins. There was some apprehensive muttering among the group, until a more richly dressed man stepped forward and shushed the lot of them, then turning back to the girls.
"Vil du skjer vite hvor mine menn og jeg er?" Kayeli looked back at the man with confusion, but Everly stepped forward and answered, "Kongsberg, Norway."
"What the hell is going on?" Kayeli turned to Everly. "Do you have any idea of what they're saying? Oh wait, yes you do, you can talk to Viking cosplayers! What on earth was he talking about? Was that Viking language? What IS Viking language? Who are they?"
"Calm down, Kayeli. You're overreacting. All he said was 'do you know where we are?' That's it" Everly shushed her sister.
During this whole conversation, the people in front of them, whoever they were, had looked on with ever growing confusion. Suddenly, the man whom they had assumed was leader (or instigator, depending on how you looked at it) stepped forward again and spoke in that unknown language.
"Fair maidens, I am Stoick. It seems that no one of my crew can understand you. What is the language you speak? But that is not important. Listen to me. We may sound crazy, but this is truth." Stoick proceeded to tell them what had happened, starting with the history of the dragons, all the way up to their long walk. Kayeli was left out of the entire thing.
"What is he saying?" Kayeli whispered in her sister's ear.
"Basically that he's here to strangle us in our sleep and steal our grandmother to eat for dinner because a fairy turned his brain purple." Everly managed to say all this with a straight face. "No, stupid," After seeing her sister's face. Funny as her face may be, she told the truth. "He says that he can't understand us and that he is here because a wise woman named Helle who he now hates trapped him here in this time as an exchange for exterminating all the dragons on his- here, apparently."
Throughout Everly's whole speech, bits and pieces of her sentences started to make sense to Stoick he heard. It seemed as though he was starting to learn their language and soon, he was sure, he would be able to speak with Everly and Kayeli freely. He waited for a few more moments then surprised them all by saying "Where are your dragons? Did Helle finally rid the world of them? I do not see any here. Hear it, men! We are free!"
Kayeli was silent for a few moments, Everly was muttering to herself. Kayeli then took the opportunity to speak. "Wait a moment. How many dragons pestered you? There were dragons all over the world?"
One of Stoick's crew was the first to answer. He responded carefully to Kayeli's questions. "I believe that there were about two hundred dragons plaguing us, and about five million over the world."
Kayeli exploded. "WHAT? There were two hundred bothering you and you got FIVE MILLION KILLED? HOW COULD YOU! Everly, we have to save the dragons! We have to bring them back! There must be eggs or something, we could save them! Everlyyyyyyyyyyyy, what are you waiting for?"
Everly hadn't moved from her spot. She was still there, muttering to herself. Kayeli had to snap her fingers in Everly's face several times to bring her back to present. "What if," Everly said? "What if, that so-called "dragons egg" that Mr. Crendon found, what if it was actually real? You know, the one with all the "runes from magic" carved into it? The blue one? You think there's actually a chance?
"I think so," said Kayeli. "Possibly. Maybe. Okay, so you want to get it? Let's go find some dragon!"
.:l-*-l:.
The Mr. Harold Crendon in question was the owner of a small horrors-and-mysteries museum, and he loved to delight and fright costumers who paid a good twenty dollars per person per viewing. His pride and glory of his collection was his dragons egg, an oversized chicken's egg made of metal, and painted a shimmery blue to give it "that magic look." At least, Harold thought it was metal. It was purchased from a blacksmith; it weighed enough for it. Harold himself had hammered small homemade small runes into it, and little shavings of blue had fallen, revealing more blue underneath. He hadn't cared at the time, or ever since.
However, when a group of about a hundred, led by his star customers, Everly and Kayeli, came rushing in, he rubbed his hands at the chance of making extra profit, never mind the strange clothes. He could already see himself buying that new luxury motor home that he'd been trying to save up for, the fifty foot one. The group of people came forward and the big one in front said, "Lead us to your dragon's egg."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. I don't just let you barge in. You have to pay the entry fee, twenty dollars for a single view. Everly, Kayeli, tell them this." Mr. Crendon was beginning to be pissed off. Who did these good for nothing, no-account, burgling thieves think they were? And by the time he'd finished this thought, his nose was broken, he was face-down in the dust, and those thieves were gone, presumably in his precious museum. He sighed as he picked himself up. He really hated doing this, but there really was no choice. He picked up his ancient phone. "Hello? Is this- NO! I am NOT calling about the theft of the grundentinal-era hagsnooper again, this is serious! Some crazy Viking lunatic peoples just barged in! I think they're here to steal my dragons-" Here Harold paused for a moment. "No, no, I'm not seeing things. Get your men out here, NOW!"
Mr. Crendon had had a secret contact with a branch of of spy type agents ever since he had helped them out of a tight spot. He currently was calling in his favor to have them retrieve and/or protect that egg. Why he was doing all this for a replaceable piece of metal, he didn't know. Maybe because it cost him two thousand dollars that he still hadn't regained.
Mr. Crendon, having been assured that his rare prize was going to be saved, turned around just in time to see the strange people taking off, with Everly and Kayeli riding piggy-back, the egg nestled safely in Kayeli's arms. Hagsnooper poop.
.:l-*-l:.
"I can't believe we did that!" Everly shouted with joy. "But do you think it's real? What if we did all that for nothing? Mr. Crendon will hate us! Stoick, hey Stoick! Where are we going?"
"We are going back deep into the forest, where we will try to hatch the dragon. I do not wish to be the cause of a whole species' extinction. I simply wanted them off our island." Stoick replied.
They at this point in time had reached the middle of the forest, and as Stoick set Everly and Kayeli own, Kayeli put the egg on the ground.
"Okay, so, does anyone know-" Kayeli paused. "Sorry, does anyone hear that?"
They all listened, and if they strained hard enough, they heard brambles being pushed out of the way, and twigs breaking. As if something heavy was headed straight towards them. Like a tank. But really, thought Everly, who would send a tank after us for some petty theft? It's probably just a land shark. Wait. Those are dangerous. And it has to be a land shark or a tank. It's too heavy for anything else. Plus, it sounds like footsteps. But either way…
"RUN!"
Stoick's crew took off running, creating a massive leaf cloud. Soon, they managed to vanish into thin air, leaving only the twins behind. They took the egg, too. Everly and Kayeli clung together and a tank, yes, a tank, stopped right in front of them. A weirdly dressed person in all purple came out to question them.
"Excuse me darlings," said the man as he leant over them. "Please call me Mr. Purple." He grimaced as the twins held in a laugh. "Have you seen a group of oddly dressed men unlike me carrying a giant blue chicken egg? I know this may sound odd but we need to catch them. They stole that egg." Mr. Purple continued to question them for a very long time.
After a while, he went back inside his tank to discuss the results of his questioning. The twins didn't hear very much, but they heard one thing loud and clear. "THEY LIED."
A group of now heavily-armed men came running out shortly afterwards. They went and forcefully picked up the girls, and dragged them into the armored vehicle. "Now take us to them. Don't worry, honeys, you won't be harmed." Said a man dressed all in electric green.
.:l-*-l:.
We had successfully outrun the men, but I felt strangely light, like I was missing a load that I had always carried. Then I remembered. We had outrun the men and their metal grounded dragons at the price of those two girls, these descendants of Hiccup.
I could tell they were her descendants, because they acted and looked like her. They had those same annoying habits, those slight twitches. It always hurt my brain to talk to them, because they were both sides of that same girl: crazy and scientific all at once. The only this missing, or should I say, extra, was Hiccup's lost foot.
But the important thing was to hatch the egg. If it was hatched, maybe it would undo Helle's magic on us and take us to our own crew, and so I could see Hiccup again, while… giving up Everly and Kayeli. I am going to miss them when this is all over, because honestly, I loved these two half Hiccups more than just one Hiccup.
But I had to stop thinking about them! This is about more people than just me. This is my whole crew, who had their own families to get back to. I set the egg on the ground. "Now, how do we hatch a dragon egg? We were so busy getting rid of them I never figured I'd want to un-… un-… UN-exterminate them."
Everyone else shifted and muttered uneasily, so I suggested we sleep on it. Who knows? Maybe the answer would come to one of us then. We all searched around for the better part of the day looking for a cave that was unoccupied by wildlife and was livable, but eventually we found it. I set the egg down between a few of my men and me, and we lay down to sleep.
.:l-*-l:.
A buzz crackled over the radio. "Mr. Purple, please obtain the egg. Objective location 28-AC. Repeat, location 28-AC."
"On it."
The man known as Mr. Purple by clients and enemies alike made his way silently across the grass at the mouth of the cave. He paused at the entrance. To any onlookers who would happen to be awake and walking in the middle of the dark forest in the middle of the night, it would appear that he was lighting a cigarette before tossing it down, possibly in disgust. What he was actually doing, however, was far more complicated. To simplify it would be to say he lit a bomb on countdown. The bomb was supposed to create a sonic noise that would leave ears bleeding (if you didn't have earplugs) and theoretically crack the egg. Theoretically.
The government was after the egg not for Mr. Crendon, but for themselves. They could care less about him, and wouldn't even pay him to get a new "fake" egg made. Some way or another, they had known it was real, and needed to keep it under lockdown to keep it safe from outside threats.
Which places these agents where they are now. Mr. Purple was the one listed down to retrieve the egg, and the twins were tied so they could do nothing but sit and watch. Then, Mr. Purple was in. In the cave. With Stoick. And the egg. As Mr. Crendon so eloquently put, hagsnooper poop.
The twins waited, fearful for a few moments. Mr. Purple soon came back out, carrying the egg, and thankfully, no corpses.
The egg was in a terrible condition. It had hairline fractures all over it, and the once shimmering sheen of the egg was gone. It was now a solid, dull, baby blue, and it was flaking bits of it off. The egg was brought into the tank and put into a space-age security unit that held it suspended in a gloppy gel. It was not appealing.
Then it started shaking. It was shaking like it had the chills and was about to get frostbite. Everly noticed that the fractures were slowly getting bigger, and now resembled mini shatters. One of the shatters fell out, and like a missing capstone, the whole structure came tumbling down. Now suspended in the gel, unmoving, maybe dead, maybe alive, was a human. A girl to be precise. She was very small, no bigger than a newborn baby, but she was clearly not a baby. Her hair was the same dark color as the twins', and she looked so similar to them that she may have been their long lost triplet. She even had the millions of freckles.
But what was strangest of all was when she started to proportionally grow. She started out as the size of a baby, and slowly came to be the size of the twins. Now there was no difference between the three, besides the clothes (or lack of). When she noticed that everyone seemed to be edging away, she went into a sort of a panic mode, and started screaming things at people in that same babbling language that Stoick first used when he appeared in the woods. Then she ran out of the side of the tank into the forest, hair streaming after her.
"Everly. Kayeli. Who was that? Whoever she is, find her. We need her alive. GO." This order came from one person dressed in a multitude of colors, but Everly and Kayeli were happy to oblige. Anything to get away from these crazy color-coordinated people.
They stepped out of the tank. "Kayeli, I'm going to let you handle this one." Everly said. "Just go in a random way until we find evidence of her or her herself."
With that, Kayeli took off, leaving Everly to follow behind her. Kayeli made straight for a certain spot, which took them straight to the mystery clone girl. When asked about it years late, Kayeli would say "I don't know how I knew. I just let my feet drag my body behind them."
They stumbled across the girl, who was in the middle of a giant mud puddle, shivering badly. Still naked. "Kayeli," Everly called. "Give her your sweater."
"Whyyyyyyyyyyy? I actually like this one."
"The poor girl needs it. Besides, I'm giving her my leggings." Everly turned back to the girl. "What's your name? Do you even have one? Can you even understand me at all?"
"Of course I can, you nimrod. Why wouldn't I? I'm Hiccup. Call me Hiccup, please no nicknames. Ever."
Both of the twins were wearing a t-shit, leggings, skirts, and sweaters. When the girls handed over the selected items, Kayeli was left with a t-shirt, skirt, and leggings, and Everly was left with a sweater, t-shirt, and a skirt. Hiccup was now presentable.
"Well, I'm Kayeli, and this is my know-it-all butt of a twin, Everly. Hello, Hiccup!"
"KAYELI! WHY? Oh, wait! What are we going to tell Stoick? The egg!" Everly was starting to get worried.
Hiccup was suspicious. "You know Stoick? You know where he is? I can't wait to see him! He's been missing for years! Everyone back at home misses him too! Even The Snotnuts of all people," Hiccup said with an eye roll. "Take me to him, please! I need to see my dad. Waiiiit… what year is this?" Hiccup was starting to get hyper.
"2015, why?"
Hiccup screamed. Long and loud. Dang, that girl had a set of lungs. Maybe she could be a flutist, or a professional mermaid.
Kayeli clamped a hand over Hiccup's mouth, and Everly hissed in her ear, "Do you want to get us eaten? Or caught?"
The girl's then grabbed Hiccup's arms and proceeded to drag her out of the space they were occupying, just as a far off rumbling and crashing noise started.
However fast the trio ran, the noise grew louder and louder. Whatever it was, was gaining on them fast.
And it didn't help that Hiccup suddenly decided to become deadweight in the other two's arms. Until she started laughing. Laughing and wheezing like there was no tomorrow.
Kayeli and Everly looked to her for an explanation, and she said, "It's the Vikings we're running from!"
The remaining two fell to the ground with Hiccup, and when Stoick and the others arrived, they found a tangle of limbs shaking on the leaves.
One of them whispered to the others, and they pulled themselves together and stood straight up, arms hanging at their sides.
And when they were all standing in a row like that, no one could tell them apart.
As one they said, "Figure out Hiccup and take her home. Look, your time is running out."
And indeed it was, for some of the men were starting to go transparent. They were being teleported back to their own time, and if they didn't take Hiccup, she'd be stuck here forever, which would cause the twins to be rocketed to the future, still her descendants.
On instinct, Stoick grabbed the one without shoes, and they all vanished with a pop!
.:l-*-l:.
"So, dears, did you have a good time?" Gothi asked
The two girls in front of her nodded.
"Look what we found!"
In unison, they held out their hands.
In them were some blue eggshell shards, carved with little Nordic runes.
Outside, a Terrible Terror chirped happily.