Capture
Hiccup ran through the streets with his contraption in the wheelbarrow, and Berk was eerily quiet. Berk, especially at that time of night, was usually a bustling example of 19th century industrialism, with people filling the streets and conversing lightly and happily with each other. Now though, not a whisper could be heard.
And then, from the depths of the night, came the call, "Hiccup, what the bloody hell are you doing?" Hiccup just kept on trucking, the call no doubt coming from the disapproving townsfolk. He could even hear the whispers of the people in the night, saying things like, "he'll probably blow himself up again", and "it's the Incident all over again", and worst of all, "maybe a dragon will get him."
Of course, no one would come outside and stop him, a combination of the fact that he wasn't well liked but mostly because they were too scared to come outside. Dragons were infamous for carrying away humans, but their main targets were mostly machine parts, which is why the machine shops were the most heavily guarded and fortified, and occasionally food, for some reason that no one had been able to understand. Dragons didn't need food, or at least none that anyone had witnessed; this was the major evidence that they were working for a master and not simply rogue machines.
Hiccup's echoing footsteps were soon masked by rapid gun fire and the sound of plasma cannons. He steered the wheelbarrow towards the sounds, scouting out a roof which he could place his device, the Knock Out, on. Damn, that really needed a better name. What could he say, he was pressed for time. He didn't even know if it would work.
His reverie was again broken by the shouts of a large man wielding a plasma cannon like a machine gun and shouting orders to other, similarly beefy men. That hulking form of a man, carrying a hundred kilo turret like it was a baby, was Stoic, the mayor of Berk. He organized the patrols and the local militia against the dragons, and he had the respect of the whole town. Well, most of their respect, with the exception of one, teeny little…
CRASH!
Hiccup swerved to avoid the burning husk of a dragon which had fallen down in his path, with Stoic looking on coolly. Hiccup managed to hide in the glare of the fire, and soon Stoic was firing manically at the next batch of dragons.
"Damn that was close," Hiccup muttered under his breath. He finally found a suitable roof to mount the device and hauled it up the back stairs. Hoisting it up, he took it out of the wheelbarrow and took out a contraption that looked like a cross between a fishnet, tesla coil, crossbow, and a bolas. It was an extremely mangled looking contraption, and it would have looked more streamlined if he had the time to finish it.
Stoic and crew had polished off most of the larger dragons by this point, and Hiccup found himself aiming the clumsy device at an empty night sky. Any dragon would do to test it, but there was one in particular that he was looking for, a dragon that no one had ever seen. A being so powerful that with one blast of its fiery breath it could take out on entire building. They called it the Night Fury.
Some small sightings of what people thought it might be had been reported, and it was reported as being jet black, with a streamlined body, and it had only been seen directly before and after it fires. He just needed to wait.
One minute became five. Five became ten. Ten became fifteen. Almost all of the dragons had been driven off or shot down, but there was one left, and it was wounded nearby. The Night Fury had been shown to be altruistic, helping its fellow dragons and not directly attacking anyone. Maybe he could get a lucky shot.
Right as he said it, a blue explosion rocked the entire town, and a sleek, black form flew up just behind the explosion. Hiccup used the sights and rapidly fired the device. A ball about 30cm wide rocketed out of the device, zooming toward the figure. In the instant before it hit the retreating shape, it expanded into a net which spread out over a rather large area, with blue arcs of electricity racing across it.
The device landed on what appeared to be the dragon's tail, and a deafening screech was heard. The dragon was now clearly visible and floundering in the air, but still flying quite fast. It arced into the air and continued its path of flight all the way into the mountains on the far side of the village, where it landed somewhere in a giant plume of fire.
"Yeah! Success-ish! It kind of worked, but I'm going to have to get it back in order to see how well it worked."
And that was when it all went horribly wrong. That last remaining dragon was now free due to the Night Fury's attack, and it was rampaging through the streets among the exploded shells of its brethren, and it stumbled against the building where Hiccup was situated. The force of the impact knocked him off of his perch and directly into the stampeding dragon's path.
Said dragon, now wingless and enraged by its recent capture, saw the nearest living thing and rushed it. That living thing happened to be Hiccup, who was about half conscious from the fall, and he stumbled backwards as fast as he could. He ran through the empty street as fast as his feeble brain could manage, but the fire spitting dragon was hot on his tail.
"Hiccup!" shouted Stoic, who saw the commotion and ran down into the stampeding dragon's path. The plasma turret glowed purple and then blew the dragon to pieces. Unfortunately, the secondary Protocol explosion blew Stoic and Hiccup back hard, where they landed against the remaining militia soldiers.
Oh, and there's one more thing you need to know.
"S-sorry…d-dad" Hiccup managed to mutter before passing out into oblivion.
