A/N: Hello! So, this is the fanfiction I was talking about in my previous stories! It is set during season 5, straight after Return of Thor Bonecrusher. Let me know in the reviews what you think, reviews make my day :). I hope you enjoy!
Hiccup sighed, shaking his head and smiling as he watched Fishlegs, Snotlout and the twins have a group hug. At least that problem's out of the way, he thought to himself. Then his eyes fell on Astrid, who was sitting on a wooden crate next to the sleeping Toothless. Hiccup saw the puzzled expression on her face and walked over.
"What's up?" He asked once he was standing next to his girlfriend.
"Well," Astrid started, looking down at the floor, then back up at her betrothed. "The question still remains, Hiccup: what did the dragon hunters want with these fish?" She gestured to the wagon full of Ice Tail Pike, then looked back up at Hiccup expectantly. Hiccup looked at the fish, frowned in thought, but didn't reply.
Jarg walked behind Krogan nervously, staying over a foot behind his leader.
"S-so you see Krogan, sir, it was impossible to see what was coming." He stuttered, watching as Krogan pushed back the curtain to the tent and walked in, stopping to turn around and face him.
"Impossible you say?" Krogan paused, holding the man's shoulder and looking towards his co-leader. "And what say you?" Jarg looked up slightly to see who his leader was talking to, then jumped. Viggo, the Viggo everything thought had died while falling into a volcano, was standing over his desk while looking over a map.
"There'll be a setback. The Ice Tail Pike are essential to our training program. Unlike this gentleman here." At this, Viggo looked up and glared at Jarg, who gasped at the sight of his scarred face. He glanced over to Krogan, who only raised an eyebrow in amusement. "Did you even manage to set plan B into motion?" Jarg looked from Viggo to Krogan, then opened his mouth to speak, but no sound came out. Krogan punched him in the stomach.
"Viggo asked you a question!" He barked, watching as the man stumbled.
"O-of course, sir!" He stammered, saluting. Viggo nodded sharply, then looked at Krogan.
"Failures have no place in my army. The bar must remain at its highest. I'd throw him down a Whispering Death hole. But that's just me." He folded his arms, turned to the side of the tent and watched smugly as Jarg gasped at his words and started to breathe heavier.
"Relax, Jarg. There will be no Whispering Death hole for you. If I did that, I wouldn't get to see you suffer. Then that would take the fun out of it." Krogan walked over to Viggo's desk, then turned to smirk at Jarg before clapping his hands to summon two of his soldiers.
"B-but we didn't fail! Plan B is in motion as we speak!" He shouted in protest as he was dragged out of the tent. Krogan watched him leave, then turned to Viggo, who was clearly thinking.
"Do you really think your genius plan B will work?" Krogan questioned, arms folded as he edged closer to the man in an attempt to appear threatening. Viggo chuckled darkly.
"Your distrust in me is heartwarming, Krogan, really it is, but you mustn't panic. I've faced those teenagers many more times than you have, let me deal with it and come back to me once I have him in my grasp." At this, he turned his back to Krogan, in an oh-so-subtle hint that it was time for him to leave. Krogan huffed, unappreciative of Viggo's style of cooperation, but reluctantly left anyway. Watching Krogan leave out of the corner of his eye, Viggo chuckled darkly again, then went back to the thought process that Krogan had so rudely interrupted, a sinister plan fitting together piece by piece, one that he was certain wouldn't fail. Not this time.
Hiccup looked outside at the quickly darkening sky that shrouded the jagged rocks that decorated Outcast Island. He heard heavy footsteps approaching from behind, followed by a very familiar gruff voice.
"Well? Are ya gonna take me offer? Or are ya gonna leave without givin' me the chance to make it up to ya?" Alvin asked, raising an eyebrow when he didn't get a reply. "Is it that hard to make up ya mind?"
"It's not that I'm thinking about. We'll take your offer and spend the night here, just like you asked. It's just... I can't seem to figure out what the Dragon Hunters were planning with the fish and your kidnapping. It all seems... odd, and mysterious. What do you think?" On hearing nothing but silence from the Outcast chief, Hiccup turned around to face him.
"What?" Hiccup questioned, taken aback by the anxious expression on Alvin's face.
"Can I have word with ya, 'Iccup? Maybe we could take a walk down towards the docks, so we can talk in private?" Alvin suggested. Hiccup looked at his unreadable expression, not sure what to make of it.
"Why can't we just talk here? There's barely anyone around," Hiccup pointed out, confused.
"There's not enough privacy 'ere. What I want to tell ya is top secret, and I can't afford other villagers hearin' it." Hiccup furrowed his forehead, the little red flag going up in his head. "It'll only be for five minutes or so, promise."
"Alright, what do you want to tell me?" Hiccup asked, reluctantly pushing aside his worries as he walked alongside the Outcast on the way to the docks.
"It's about those bandits and the Dragon Hunters. I think I have some information that may help ya find out what they really want." At the mention of the Dragon Hunters, Hiccup looked up at Alvin in curiosity, but Alvin was looking out to sea. "The bandits made some... threats. They may give us a clue."
"What kind of threats?" Hiccup asked, subconsciously rubbing his chin with his hand in thought.
"I don't fully understand 'em myself," Alvin commented, stopping to stand on the edge of the cliff, looking over the docks that lay below them. "Maybe you'd understand 'em better than I did. Something about a... training program?" Hiccup had walked up to the edge of the cliff and now stood next to Alvin, deep in thought. Training program? Dragon Hunter training? Dragon training? What kind of dragon eats all that fish? His mind whirred, relentlessly thinking of a solution based on this new information. He didn't notice how Alvin had left his side and was now making his way behind him.
"I'm sorry, 'Iccup. I really don't 'ave a choice," Alvin muttered once he was right behind the scrawny Viking.
"What was that Alv-" A burly fist collided with the side of his head, cutting him short. He saw the rocky ground below him come closer and closer, before everything turned black.
Astrid sat on the doorstep of her temporary hut, watching the other Riders say their goodnights to their dragons and leave to their respective huts. Everything was calm and peaceful. Except...
She hadn't seen Hiccup go to his hut yet. Where is he? And where's Toothless? She decided to check his hut in case he'd snuck in without her noticing. By the gods, if he deliberately avoided me, he's got another thing coming! She opened the door slowly, peering into the darkness.
"Toothless? Hiccup?" She whispered, wondering if Hiccup had already fallen asleep. She heard a purr, followed by a pattering of paws. A few seconds later, two big green eyes appeared in front of her, gazing at her expectantly. Toothless pushed past her, glancing outside as if expecting Astrid to be bringing Hiccup to bed. Upon only seeing Stormfly, the dragon sighed slightly before purring at Astrid, who was watching him with curiosity.
"You don't know where he is either, do you?" Astrid said, looking into Toothless' brilliant green eyes that largely resembled Hiccup's. Toothless gave another sad purr in response. Should we go look for him? No harm done in looking for him. But... he's probably thinking about the Dragon Hunters and wants to be alone. But then again, what if something has happened... He always manages to get himself into trouble. What's the likelihood of that though? We're allies with the Outcasts... Everything should be fine... right? I'll wait until morning to go and find him. She looked back at the dragon.
"Don't worry, he's probably thinking up a genius plan to sort out these Dragon Hunters and will be back in the morning. If he's not here by then, we'll go looking for him." Astrid said soothingly, resting her hand on his snout. "I'm going back to my hut, see you in the morning." Astrid patted the dragon before walking out the door towards her own hut, smiling at the sound of Toothless lighting his rock slab and curling up. She opened the door to her own temporary hut, whistling to Stormfly to go to sleep and then looked out over the moonlit sea and whispered as if she was talking to him.
Be safe, Hiccup.
In, out, in, out, in, out. He was being dragged in and out of the inky blackness and he hated it. The slow feeling of coming back around was a terrible one. Then the pain hit, a pounding pain in the side of his head. His eyelids felt heavy and it took all his effort to force them open. A moan escaped his lips as he tried to focus on his surroundings. He felt the hard wooden floorboards beneath his head and motioned to sit up, only to realise his hands were tied in front of him. He blinked. Great, I've gone and got myself kidnapped. Again. He tried to remember how he got into this mess, but his brain was foggy and uncooperative. Staring at the ceiling, he focussed on the rocking of the boat while trying to gather enough energy to pull himself up.
Wait... rocking of the boat... What in the name of Thor is going on? His body went rigid as he heard the wooden deck above him creaking and footsteps coming down the stairs. Out of instinct, his legs flailed as he tried to get a grip on the ground and push himself as far away from the stairs as possible. No, Hiccup. Don't show him your fear. Whoever he is... He grunted, struggling to sit up as the figure of his captor revealed itself.
"Alvin?!" Was the first thing he shouted when he saw him. "Wha- Why? How?" His mind whirred, unable to apprehend what he was seeing. "I thought we were allies, Alvin. Allies. Where did all that go? Three years we've been at peace, and now you decide to throw it all away again by kidnapping me? While I took your offer to stay the night so you could make it up to us. We've just rescued you from your own kidnapping, so you decide to return the favour, huh?" He shouted. Alvin blinked, face going from emotionless to sorrowful to almost frightened.
"I didn't have a choice," He muttered, just loud enough for him to hear.
"Oh, so now you're playing the victim? You think I like sitting here tied up? No. You know what, I've had enough of this." Hiccup shouted in reply, scrambling to his feet, grabbing Inferno from its sheath with his tied hands and charging towards the unprepared Alvin. He struck down, aiming for his head, though Alvin dodged, pulling his own axe out of its holster and blocking every blow. Suddenly, Alvin swung his axe, hitting Inferno and sending it flying clean out of Hiccup's hands. He picked it up, throwing it out of the hatch and onto the deck. Hiccup ran at Alvin, fists clenched ready to attack, but Alvin grabbed the rope that bound his wrists and snapped it. Hiccup blinked, not knowing what to think, but before he could react, Alvin pulled both this arms behind him and re-tied his wrists. Hiccup felt Alvin's hand push him to the ground and looked up to see him tie his legs together at the knees.
"Why are you doing this?" Hiccup shouted, exasperated as he watched Alvin pull a wad of fabric out of his pocket.
"I don't want to do this, but I have no choice," Alvin replied quietly, before his fist collided with the side of Hiccup's head once again, sending Hiccup tumbling into the inky blackness of unconsciousness again.
A/N: So that happened... Hope you enjoyed the first chapter. All will be revealed in future chapters, meanwhile, please leave me a review to let me know what you thought. I have a week until I go on holiday (to me good old home country England) so I will try to upload as many chapters as possible in that week, then after that, I won't be updating for three weeks. I was doubting whether or not I should publish this before my holiday but I decided that having this up already would be good motivation to write asap. Anyway, enough of my ramble, I'll try to write the next chapter soon, but until then, have a nice day ;)
~httydfangirl123