Yes, this is another HTTYD fanfic. Shut up. I need a lot of practice with writing, what does it matter what I choose to write *cough*obsess*cough* about?

Yes, this is another bullying fix. You might see a few more of these, since I myself have been bullied since I could remember and I find it...easier to write about and understand.

This is mainly vent.

No, I don't own HTTYD. Damn you.

It was a clear day on Berk, something that didn't come around too often. There had been a good few day where it wasn't raining, snowing, or hailing. You could almost see the sun through the gloomy gray clouds. This, to the villagers who lived on the rocky island, was a good day.

It was too bad Hiccup wasn't out to enjoy it like he usually would have been. The fishbone was inside the forge when even Gobber had taken the day off. He was scribbling various designs on a piece of paper and trying to fin the appropriate bits of metal for what he wanted to make. He had been Gobber's apprentice since he was ten, and two years later he had become rather skilled with making decorations or other small trinkets, such as pins or amulets.

The boy looked up and out the side of the smithy, seeing the other kids who so often tormented him. Ruffnut and Tuffnut, the widely known twins of Berk. Berk didn't get twins often, but he found it hard to see these two as a blessing even so. His cousin, Snotlout. He was muscular even for their age group, and he was constantly pulling on Ruffnut's braids or pushing her down. Pre-teen flirting methods. Fishlegs was taller and wider than the others, and he mainly stayed to the back and tried to be friends with them. He had better luck than Hiccup did.

Then, there was Astrid. Astrid Hofferson. Astrid "don't-talk-to-me-again-or-I'll-kick-your-head-in" Hofferson. Such fond memories. She was the only one of the teens he truly had a soft spot for. She was kind to him -well...not kind but not brutally cruel- when the others weren't around. He was grateful for that. As soon as she spotted him watching her, however, she sent him a glare that hurt even from a distance. He could still make out the blue in her eyes hidden behind her smooth blonde hair.

He grumbled and returned to the inside of the blacksmith to start work on his latest project. The very reason he was staying in.

He set to work gathering the metals, and began using various tools to construct his item. It took a lot out of the scrawny little boy, but he managed to finish the basic shape and preset that he needed by the end of the day. He slept in the shop, and got to work on it once he felt the sun on his back.

That took another half day. By the time he was done, he gazed down at it lovingly. It was small and looked complicated. One of the reasons it had taken him so long to construct it. He held it up in the sunlight with a bigger grin.

Very rarely did Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III ever take pride in something he did -mainly because most of the time it backfired and ended up breaking something- but this was something he felt generally happy about.

The little trinket was something of a good fortune charm - or so he hoped - he had constructed out of copper and iron. It was small, about the height of three fingers and the width of one, but he still thought it was wonderful. When you curved your fingers around it, you would find it fit perfectly in your hand and the longer you kept it there, the less you noticed it's presence.

He held it carefully in his freckled hands as he stepped from the shop. The sky was darker than the day before, and hinted that it would soon begin to rain. He had to hurry.

He raced down the hill in a straight bee line to where he knew he would find the group. He slowed to a stop, seeing them at the docks. He could hear Snotlout's obnoxious laugh from here. He cringed and took a deep breath, hating that he was still scared to approach the gang. Personal experience taught him that should you come too close, you might get sucked in and used as a human punching bag.

He clutched his hand a little tighter around the trinket and strolled over. They all stopped to stare at him ,eyes cold and judgmental. Hiccup the Useless had returned.

He swallowed the huge lump in his throat, and in the strongest voice he could muster he asked, "C-can I spe-speak to Astrid, please?" He hated the way he sounded, especially as he saw the cocky smirk on Snotlout's face grow into a full fledged grin.

He had no idea he was asking, but he felt the action important. He looked at the girl in question, turning slightly away in case she decided to hit him. She crossed her arms, gave him an emotionless look and replied, "Speak, then."

"I meant a-alone.."

"Not on your life!" Snotlout barked with a laugh, earning a high five from Tuffnut.

"Just say it here." She ordered. By the way she shifted her feet, he knew it was impossible now. She wasn't moving.

Ignoring Snotlout completely, he looked at Astrid and bashfully motioned for her to hold out her hand.

He held out his own hand, fist trembling slightly. She looked at him quizzically as he dropped the item into her now open palm. She looked down at it, and for a second he thought he had a chance. She seemed to like it, even. Her eyes sparked for the smallest second, then she snapped her head back to him when the others just stared in silence.

Snotlout burst out laughing, causing the others to join in as if they had been awaiting his own reaction.

"What a loser!"

"Wow, seriously?"

"I can't believe he actually did that!"

Hiccup flinched visibly at every comment, but nothing hurt more than when Astrid Hofferson, the girl he had told himself he had been in love with for seven years, shot him that look.

The look that told him everything he needed to know. Bitterness, loathing, embarrassment, hatred even.

She let out an aggravated grunt and pushed him roughly off the edge of the dock. He tumbled into the water with a yelp of surprise, feeling the freezing cold water surround him. He saw her face the whole time he went down. Nothing changed, if anything at all it just became darker. She took the trinket and flung it straight at him. It bounced off his forehead and into the water, shimmering as it went.

He grabbed it quickly before it could sink any further and looked up at all the faces staring down at him.

Snotlout had come to stand beside Astrid, crossing his arms and looking down at him with this...look on his face. Superiority or intimidation. Or both. His shoulder touched Astrid's and Hiccup felt the feeling of regret and hurt in his gut turn to rage and confusion.

He heard it thunder, and glanced upward just as the rain began to fall.

He looked at her and was thankful for the fact that he was wet and it was raining, for once. She wouldn't be able to see the physical sadness leak from his eyes. She scoffed and turned away, and as she walked the others followed her singing a tune about Hiccup the Useless. It wasn't anything new - had had heard it his whole life.

He sat out there in the water, fist clenched around the trinket so hard it hurt.

What a stupid Idea. How could he ever have thought it would work? That maybe, for five seconds of his life, she would smile at him. She would treat him differently. What was he thinking?

He pulled himself from the water and sat at the edge of the dock, soaked to the bone and freezing cold. He stared at the object in his hands. Now that he looked at it, it was just an ugly lump of metal. On the back side, where it didn't fit into your fingers, he had her name carved in it and the picture of a battle axe.

He thought it had been a good idea. His gaze turned to anger and loathing as he glared down at it. He couldn't bring himself to throw it away though. No, he gripped onto that small little lump for all he had left.

He didn't know how long he sat a while. He knew because his father never went to look for him unless it was very dark out, or if Snotlout had been caught bragging about the exceptional beating he had bestowed on the village idiot.

He felt Stoick's grip on his shoulder, and looked up at his father's pitying stare. He closed his eyes and got to his feet himself, pushing past him.

The long trek up the hill moved surprisingly fast. The memories of past moments similar to these swarmed in his head. It had all went downhill once his mother died, at least in his mind. He was so caught up in these thoughts, so much shame at the feeling of knowing he was crying, he didn't notice the jeers. He barely heard them as he passed the others houses. He knew his father was behind him, but both kept silent. He felt the pain reside in his core, and suddenly something changed.

He felt the emotions bubble and churn in his stomach, then rise to his chest. Clenching his fists even harder, he whirled around, the hot tears of anger and bitterness and confusion falling from his eyes. He panted for a second, feeling like he couldn't breath. His father took a step towards him, but was halted by Hiccup's surprisingly loud voice:

"Hiccup the Useless!" The boy threw up his arms erratically, taking a step back then forward again, "Hiccup the failure! Stupid, stupid boy!" He shouted at his father, nowhere else to direct the energy.

He turned around again and shouted more, at the mountains and the thundering sky, "Fishbone! Failure! Featherbrain!" His voice was hoarse and strained but he kept going, shouting every cruel jibe he could think of. None were made up. He truthfully had heard each and every one over the course of his short life.

"He could have made it better! He should have swung it harder! He might have been a good viking!" The tears fell harder, "No wonder your mother is gone, she probably died of disappointment!" He flinched back, taking another step backward as he remembered what Tuffnut had said to him about a year after her passing.

Hiccup didn't realize his voice had drawn a lot of attention of nearby villagers. Many were staring, their faces grim as he made more a fool out of himself in front of everybody this time.

"Let him hurt, it's his own fault! Let's all watch and laugh as the village idiot tries to make us proud!" His voice was louder now, but it was quieter as the last of his energy went into the last sentence, "Why would she want you, when she could have me?" He screamed, quoting Snotlout to a T. If he had been watching, he would have seen his cousin flinch.

Breathing hard, shoulders sagging and totally open and defeated, Hiccup looked around. What he saw made him want to vomit, and he would have had he any energy left to. The villagers stood watching, holding kids against their sides. Some faces were hurt, some faces grim. Others were disappointed or disgusted or even light and humorous.

He saw his bullies watching, every one of them. The twins were different for once. While Ruffnut was staring at the ground, rubbing her arm and avoiding eye contact, Tuffnut was sniggering and looking at Snotlout.

His cousin stood beside his father, Spitelout. Snot was glaring at his cousin, disgusted he was related to the boy. The psychopath, as he would probably be labelled. The boy who talked to himself. His uncle Spitelout was looking at the ground, eyes closed. To ashamed to look.

His gaze traveled to Astrid's house without realizing. She was the worst of all. She stood there, her face pained but well hidden from the others. He looked down at the metal in his hands and felt more anger boil up. He threw it hard against the side of his house, and it crashed and bounced off into the grass. He let out a pained cry and his legs buckled.

Suddenly his father was there, holding the scrawny twelve year old boy against his chest as he pounded his fist against his shoulders. He ran out of energy and shouted into his thick clothing and fuzzy beard, "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

His voice was just...broken.

It was filled with all the emotions that came with what he had experienced - Bitterness, anger, hatred, sadness, grief and confusion. Stemming from losing his mother at a young age, and all connections to his friends. He used to play with the twins, used to have fun. Fishlegs had been a good friend, and Snotlout had even been nice to him more than once. They had been family.

He even used to play with Astrid.

But his mother had died, gone up and left him alone with a distant and disappointed father who suddenly cared about making his son stronger and better than he was. Snotlout was forced to play with him, but when it turned into the game of 'lets see if I can make him bleed' he was taken off and not allowed anymore.

The twins went with him, and the only person who stayed longer was the blonde, axe wielding warrior girl, Astrid. Even she hadn't stayed long, no more than a month or two. Eventually she stopped wanting to play with him and went off with Snotlout and the others.

He had lost his last friend two months after losing his mother, and no matter how hard he tried for all those years to show that he was stronger, that he wasn't useless, it was thrown back in his face. His attempts to make friends were met with scorn, his ability to make things in the forge met with 'could have's and 'what if's.

He didn't know why he kept trying anymore. But there was always that flame inside him, that if he kept forcing himself to do the things he believed would make him better, one day somebody would come along and be friends. All he wanted was one friend, just one. They didn't have to have anything about them, just the willingness to forgive him for what he was doing wrong. Or even pretend to.

He always looked to Astrid, feeling closest to her because she was the last one to leave. But she shoved everything back at him and twisted the knife, so to speak. Threw salt in his wounds and kicked him while he was down.

He didn't know when his father had picked him up, but when he found himself at the tall wooden door he simply went inside and ran up the stairs. That night he spent in his room, curled up against the wall and sniffing as the first signs of a cold set in.

It took a week, but Hiccup finally managed to get out of the house. Well, his father finally got up the nerve to force him. He sat outside just beside the stairs near the porch, playing with the grass. He spotted something shiny in the grass, and when he picked it up he realized it was the thing he had made.

He turned it around in his hands, his stomach turning as he remembered the night. He closed his eyes and clenched his fists around it.

That's when he noticed the stares.

Even through his bleary, red rimmed eyes he could see the looks they gave him. Surprise, disappointment, and awkward avoidance of all eye contact.

He noticed Astrid walking by, axe slung over her shoulder. She stopped, frozen as she stared at him. Blue shifted to green as she locked eyes with him. He was the first to look away, sniffling and hugging his knees to his chest.

He didn't hear her until she sat down. He avoided eye contact and stared with concentration down at the ground.

She sat there, tense and rigid. She kept her mouth firmly closed and gaze straight at the ground.

Finally, she looked at him. He risked a glance at her and found her stare determined and strong, but less hardened and cold.

She held out her hand and said in exasperation, "Give it here." She didn't even look at him as she said it.

He knew she was referring to the item, but he just shifted and closed his fist a little tighter around it, "So you can throw it back in my face again? No. "

Thwap! "Ow!"

"I'm not joking around, Haddock. Give it here, or I'm leaving."

Reluctantly, he handed it over. She turned it over in her hands, face scrunched up the slightest bit. In other circumstances, he would have considered it cute. But all he saw when she did this now was disapproval. It made his stomach hurt.

"What is it?" She asked after a second, bouncing it in the air and catching it again.

"I don't know. It's supposed to -" sneeze "- fit in your...hand."

She nodded once, and slipped it into the small pouch she kept at the side of her skull belt. Then she punched him in the shoulder as hard as she could, making him cry out.

"Don't ever do that again, you hear me? My mom is freaking out at me and she's real worried about you, Haddock. Dad won't even let me come out of the house until I apologize, even though I don't feel like I should. "

Of course, she would never admit that the second part was more or less a lie.

"So put up or shut up, fishbone." She got up and gave his head a light shove to the side as she did so. She took the object out of her pocket, turned it over in her hand again, and kept on down the trail with her axe swinging on one shoulder.

He stared after her, sniffled once, and lay back in the grass. He let the wind soothe his rough edges, and let the grass cool the hot wound in his heart.

The boy had a lot ahead of him.

A couple years later, Astrid Hofferson came home. It was the first 'good day' Berk had seen in at least two years, and she felt a strange nostalgia come over her. She went up to her room after putting Stormfly behind her home, and lifted up the floorboard. There, a small metal box held memorable things. A bolt from her first axe, a pretty stone she had found and...a lump of metal. She picked it up, turning it around in her palm and clenching her fist around it. Still fit.

"Astrid!"

She peaked out her window and saw a taller boy with russet hair and freckles covering his face, and intense green eyes. "Ready to go for another round, or what?"

"Yeah, hold on, Hiccup!" She called back, and plopped the item back into the box and moved the floor board back into place.

He greeted her with a smile and a small wave, "It's the first good day I can ever remember having in..well, forever, really..."he looked up at the clouds with a small smile on his face. It didn't appear unless she was there for the most part.

"It hasn't been sunny like this for years..." Astrid commented, "Perfect weather for flying."

Hiccup, surprised, looked at her. He scratched the back of his head awkwardly and said to her quietly, "I wasn't talking about a good day as in the weather. I meant...good as in..." he searched for the word but nothing came to him. "Good." He shrugged.

She smiled at him and nudged his shoulder, "Don't get all gushy on me, Haddock. Come on, while there's still daylight. I'll race you to the cove and back!" She challenged, running to her Deadly Nadder, Stormfly, who was busy gazing at itself in a bucket of water.

"Your on!" He laughed, hobbling as fast as he could over to Toothless.

Through the good times and the bad, the young boy had prevailed. It was a challenge, and it was met with many bumps, but he was here at last. For the first time in a long time, marveling at the companionship he felt and genuinely letting himself go. He had not done this since his mother's passing. He looked over at Astrid and they both shared a knowing smile.

Yes, it certainly was a good day.

This was much longer than I intended it to be...so sorry for that.

I really wanted to write this...have no idea.

Hate it, Despise it or loathe it?

NOTE:
Not based entirely on a personal experience, but the feelings he feels, his thoughts, and things like this are things I have said and thought many times. I have been bullied literally since the first day of kindergarten.