A/N: Yeah, I know I previously marked this as complete but this has been sitting on my computer begging to be added. Enjoy!
It is a fact of life; there are monsters everywhere.
When I was a youngster, my mother told me much about them. Sometimes I think that she delighted in telling me those stories, tales that she surely knew scared me. I would huddle against her warm side, staring up at her with wide eyes as she told me accounts of the horrible things that lurked, just waiting for a nice tidbit like me to wander too close.
The monsters frightened me, they thrilled me, and I would try with all my might not to squeal in fear as she leaned in close to deliver some terrible, gruesome detail.
Through my mother, I learned of their terrifying ways before I ever took my first step. Through my father, who was an intimidating presence in his own right, I learned that the tales she told me were true.
At first, my mind rebelled and protested that they were too horrifying to be true! But they were also too horrifying to be made up. The survivors who sometimes limped home to die slow, agonizing, and thorougly inglorious deaths of fleshrot and disease proved that throughly. These were not the deaths that our fiercest ones dreamed and sang of, but still they were ready, night after night, to lay their lives on the line in our struggle for life.
And struggle we do, gloriously. At least, that is how those older than I tell it as we battle the monsters, and the climate here in the far north, beyond where most of our kind dare. And we, here on this tiny island, continue to battle and persevere.
Partially, it is because we must fight the monsters to survive. And partially, it's because our kind love living best when survival is an adversary to be overcome. An obstacle is only an obstacle until you beat it's head into the ground, sever that from the body, and set the whole thing on fire. At least, that's what one of my father's friends used to say, right up until the night when one of those horrible, misshapen beasts sliced him in half as he sang a victory song over one of it's kin.
I think that was when I realized, I am not completely like the others of my kind. Unlike them, I was actually afraid of the monsters. They did not fill me with joy, or enrapture me with the desire to rend and destroy, as they seemed to do to the others. They only filled me with dread, and the wish to flee far and away from them.
My mother died when I was still small, her warm light snuffed out and gone. No longer would she tell me stories, no longer would she sing me songs. No longer would she shield me from my father.
My father, from the time of my first memory, always seemed vaguely disappointed. The place where we lived was inhospitable. The food we ate was sparse. The foes we faced, in our desperate bid for sustinence and survival were fierce. Our little family, small to begin with, was made smaller by the gaping absense of my mother. For all his efforts, our settlement was cranky, full of strife, and discontent.
But none of those things seemed to disappoint him as much as I did.
My father, you must understand, was an impressive, daunting figure. The air shook with the force of his raised voice. His fierceness was known to be second only to the unquestioned force of nature known as my mother's rarely-seen rage, which was spoken of in whispers even after her death by those around us.
My father, alone now, bore the responsibility for the safety of all our warriors. It was he who led every expedition from the craggy rocks that marked the small but tenacious perch our kind held. It was he who held back, scanning every battlefield for the monsters who would attack us. It was he, my father, a little bit past his prime and a lot past his patience, who would charge in and attempt to give cover or aid to those who needed it during those battles. And as I said, he was forced now to do it alone.
My father might be a great warrior, whose strength was unrivaled even among our kind and all who had heard of us, but even he could not be in many places at once.
He needed an heir. He needed a successor. He needed a fierce warrior he could mold in his own image, as his father had shaped him and as his father had shaped him, all the way back up our prestigious line to the first who'd borne our great name.
What he got was me.
As a newborn, I was small, and sickly. My father consulted the advice of the elders, who looked me over as one might examine a curious new insect. They told him to make certain I was fed well, a feat not easily managed in our ill-supplied little home, and I would be fine. My father, somehow, made it happen. My health recovered, but I was still small.
At the time my mother died, I was still small for my age. My father, whose repeated entreaties to the elders had brought many suggestions but no results, was quite sullen whenever he spoke to me or of me. His sharp, piercing eyes almost seemed to cut me apart, picking out every detail of what was wrong with me.
I was too small, too weak, too hesitant, too distractable, and my father, my great father, who was known as the Great Defender; the one who stared death in the face night after night and laughed, was aging faster than ever, slowly being killed by the crushing disappointment that was me. And as hard as I tried, as earnestly as I attempted to imitate him, I did not seem to be shaping up as a great warrior of my parents' ability.
"One day", he told me as the evening sky darkened, lighting the stony ground of our home in deepening color, "You will face me in combat. On that day, you must fight for my position. You must be strong enough, fast enough, agile enough to defeat me unquestionably and take my place."
"But I can't," I whispered, eyes staring hopelessly at the ground.
"I know," he replied, the deep rumble of his voice shaking my very bones, "but you must still do so."
"But I can't," I repeated, head upraised, eyes pleading for him to see that he asked the impossible.
His stormy eyes did not hesitate to meet mine, and I ducked my head slightly in subconscious respect for his great might. Those cutting eyes of his saw, and narrowed. Under their scrutiny, I fought not to squirm and shy away. To do so was to show unforgivable weakness.
"You must not be so weak," he chided, and I fought with every fiber of my being to meet his gaze once more. Before I knew what was happening, his tremendous bulk had pinned me to the rocky ground, and held me there without effort.
"You must NOT be so weak," he growled, and I could see the quiet desperation in his restless eyes. His fear, which frightened me far worse than his rage ever had, visible for the first time that I could recall in my life. "My son, you cannot be weak. ALL of us will one day depend on you. If you are weak, we will all be devoured, one by one until there are none of us left."
What could I do? What could I say? That I was not him was apparent, everyone remarked on it when he was out of earshot. That I was not my mother was as obvious, and everyone commented upon that as well. How could I ever hope to take my father's place? How could I possibly hope to measure up, in even a small way, to the legacy of my parents? How could I face the monsters when I could not even meet my father's deathly gaze?
"Those.. creatures," I fought not to stammer, battling with my own voice to sound pensive instead of panicked as I tried not to think of the hideous tales my mother had filled my head with, of the monsters that killed in the dark. "Can they really be defeated? Can we actually win against them?"
My father's expression changed, and I could see the fire return to his eyes. "They can be," he replied, fierce determination now marking his features. "They are mortal, as we are mortal. They can be killed, and they can die. Our kind know this, and their kind know this, and we will fight until the last of them fall." I watched, awed, as Sol's descent backlit my father in a glorious inferno of colored light.
"You, my son," Stoick the Vast commanded, looking as imposing in my eyes as Odin himself, "WILL become a viking. You will do so, and fulfill your destiny as my heir. You will do so, and lead Berk to glory."
I felt myself nodding in agreement. Somehow, I had to learn how to kill the monsters.
After all, it was my duty.
