You guys had so many good names! Okay, I had to pick and sorry for leaving any one out but the name of the Whispering Death (who is a male) is….
Stalkgrinder
Anyway, this story I put as humorous mainly because it is humorous. I will have, or at least plan to, have some moments where hurt/comfort comes into play, though.
Disclaimer: I own nothing
It was midday on Berk as Stoick pace back and forth in the Haddock house, pondering and venting his worries. Gobber sat in his chair by the fire pit, listening and carving something out of wood.
"I'm a terrible father, Gobber." He said; summing up what was most bothering him.
"You're not a terrible father, you were a terrible father." Stoick ignored that comment and continued.
"He almost died on more than one occasion that is unacceptable in that amount of time period! He got attacked by a troll," Gobber lifted his pointer finger up signaling the number one, "damaged his shoulder more than one time," Gobber's middle finger lifted up signaling the number two, "got captured by Alvin, and who knows how many times his life was endangered then," this time Gobber lifted the rest of his fingers. He had to stop at ten because that was all the fingers he had. "And he got poisoned, and I bet you that Mildew did it!"
"So why don't you arrest him?" Gobber asked casually.
"I—can't… I don't have any evidence." Stoick said in defeat.
"Yeah, that guy is a slippery one."
"Should I be more…" Stoick was stuck on which word to use.
"Strict?"
"Yes!"
"Nah, that's the last thing you want to be."
"Huh?"
"Well if your too strict, then he's just gonna want to rebel, and then you'll have more problems."
"Then what am I to do, Gobber?"
"Keep doing what you have been doing."
"Which is…?"
"Do you love him as your son?"
"Yes,"
"Do you show him attention?"
"Yes,"
"Do you give him free space and let him be who he is?"
"Yes,"
"Do you allow him to go out and kill some bugs, or smash a rock into another one's face, or get his head stuck in the sand down by the beech, or get his arm devoured by a Monstrous Nightmare?"
"Uh…?"
"Or even allow him to sneak up to Mildew's house when he's asleep and steal some of his weapons he leaves hanging on the walls? By the way, did you see he has pictures of his three late wives and one of his sheep?" Stoick didn't reply, how could he? He just stood in his place and stared in unbelief at Gobber.
"Okay, maybe not those last tidbits, but the point is you're doing a good job." He said, continuing to carve the figurine.
"Gobber, what are you making?"
"I was making an owl, but then it started to look like Alvin, so I just continued from there. Look I even made one of Hiccup riding Toothless!" he exclaimed while holding up a small wooden figure of such. It was pretty good, details were just about exact. Stoick massaged his temples and closed his eyes.
"I still feel like I'm not protecting him enough." After finishing up with the wooden Alvin, Gobber picked both up and examined them.
"Hey, these could be like… action figures!" He began to make shooting noises as he made Toothless dive from the sky and pretend to blow up Alvin, making little explosion sounds when hits were landed.
"Gobber, I'm being serious."
"Yeah, so am I. I could make a ton of these." he said happily as he made the little wooden Alvin fly into the air and fall into the soup that lay on the table in front of him. Stoick's hands were on his face now so he didn't see. He tried to fish it out with a spoon, but it slid off and fell back in.
"Don't worry about it, Stoick." He said finally getting the Alvin figurine out. When Stoick cast a glance at Gobber, he was sucking on the wooden figure like a child does with an icy pop.
Toothless landed with grace onto the soft grass, his rider jumping off and meeting up with his friends. Stoick and Gobber walked down to them greeting them.
"Did you have fun swimming?" Stoick asked. Tuffnut was giggling.
"We saw Snotlout's butt." Stoick and Gobber look at each other both sporting a confused and worried face expression. Snotlout, who was getting off of Hookfang, immediately went on the defensive.
"Hey, I have a cute butt!" This caused Astrid to gag. Hiccup laughed at this, but suddenly his breath was hitched and his body jerked a little. He hiccupped.
"What was that?" Ruffnut asked, as all were looking at Hiccup oddly.
"I—I don't know." Hiccup replied just as bewildered. *hiccup*
"There you just did it again!" Astrid exclaimed. Hiccup clamped his mouth shut with his hands. Gobber came over and opened his mouth peering in to see if he could find the source.
"Hmmm"
*hiccup*
"Woah" Gobber said as he backed away as if Hiccup were going to bite the only hand he had left off.
"You keep saying your name." Fishlegs commented.
"I don't know what's wrong; I'm not doing anything; just breathing."
"Ooo, try to hold your breath for a while so they'll go away." Snotlout suggested. Hiccup shrugged his shoulders and took in a deep breath. Seconds later, he let it out and breathed in.
"Did it work?" Astrid asked.
"I think it did. *Hiccup*" Every one sighed.
"Wait, I think I have an idea." Gobber said.
Hiccup's world turned upside down, literally. Gobber's idea involved having Gobber hold Hiccup upside down until his hiccups were gone.
"Anything happening?" Gobber asked.
"My blood's rushing to my head and I see black spots in my vision." Hiccup answered, his face first pale, then red, then turning purple. Gobber flipped Hiccup right side up and sitting him down. When Hiccup's face was back to its original color, he got up and walked over to the forge.
"Where are you going?" Astrid called out.
"I have a new design I want to finish." He said, waving goodbye as they went their separate ways.
Berk's jail center
A long and sorrowful sigh echoed throughout the empty cells that lined the walls. Savage was clutching the metal bars, the upper half of his body was propped up against them and the lower half was limply spread on the floor.
"Alvin, we need to get out of here!" he said whinnying. Alvin hit him across the face,
"Get a hold of ye self, Savage. We've only been here for two months." Alvin stated, giving the impression those two months for him was like two hours.
"But we haven't even managed to escape once!"
"Who accused me of planning on escaping?"
"Not me, sir. But, uh, if I may…"
"Go on—"
"What is your plan exactly?"
"I have some faith in you Savage, you find out soon enough."
In the Great Hall, the teens were gathered around at the tables eating their mutton and drinking their mead. Stoick finished talking to one of the elders, excused himself and walked over to them. He noticed Hiccup wasn't among them and began to question his whereabouts.
"Where's Hiccup?" he asked catching the attention of the teens. Fishlegs swallowed the mutton in his mouth and answered his chief.
"Last I saw he was still down at Gobber's forge." He nodded his head, the others doing the same, and then left.
Hiccup giggled when Toothless once again showed off his bat like skills, hanging upside down from the chains in the Dragon Academy. Hiccup was on the chains too, but for a different reason of course. Toothless continued to show off and entertain Hiccup as he worked.
Stoick entered the Academy calling for Hiccup. When Hiccup answered back, Stoick looked up and saw he was balancing on one of the square chain links where they intercept.
"What are you doing up there?"
"I saw that some of the chains were rusted and just about ready to fall off. So I had Gobber help me create this." He said as he held up a crude making of pliers.
"What is it?" Stoick asked.
"We haven't given it a name yet," Hiccup called Toothless over and the two came back down to Stoick.
Jumping off of Toothless and walking up to his father with said pliers in his hand, "But it gets the job done well." His father took the pliers and examined them. "This one's just a prototype." Hiccup finished. Stoick nodded in satisfaction, handing the pliers back to Hiccup who opened his vest and hooked it onto his side.
"So, you hungry, it's almost sun down."
"No, not really."
"At least get something to drink, come on." Stoick said, leading Hiccup back to the Great Hall with Toothless following.
The two went back to the Great Hall, finding the majority of the tribe standing around Bucket, who was on one of the tables. Stoick found Gobber and walked over to him, leaving Hiccup to watch whatever Bucket was about to do.
Bucket had managed to stack most of the plates and cups in one tower and was about to finish it off with a cup at the top. The cup stayed when he let go and the crowd cheered and clapped. Hiccup smiled and clapped as well, but frowned when he was accompanied by Mildew.
A green Terrible Terror flew into the Great Hall and crashed into the tower of dirty kitchen ware, making it tumble all over the crowd. There were screams of both laughter and irritation.
"Ah, look at that. A perfectly stable society wrecked and left in ruins all thanks to a…dragon." Mildew said, emphasizing the word dragon to Hiccup. Hiccup narrowed his eyes at him and turned to face the elder.
"You're the only person who thinks that Mildew. I don't know why you hate dragons, but they've helped us in more ways than we can count."
"Is that what your view point of your future tribe? That we're weak and can't fend for ourselves?"
"I never said that; I doesn't hurt to ask for help every once in a while. They understand that," Hiccup said pointing to the crowd, "and apparently you don't."
"Humph, Alvin's found a better use for them; using them as weapons of war. A better and tactical use, if I may say, keeps their population under control."
This angered Hiccup to no end and was about to put the elder in a head lock and choke him to death, but his father called him over and he'd probably get in serious trouble if he were to harm Mildew without evidence of his words being said.
He stomped past the rotten old man and up to his father.
"Ah, Hiccup; Gobber didn't know you finished the design for that thingy. He wanted to see them." Hiccup took the pliers out and gave it to Gobber.
"Let me see these. Boy, I sure am a good teacher. Look at that, craftsmanship." The surrounding adults awed at the unknown tool. Hiccup smiled and rolled his eyes.
"Oh, we got to feed Alvin and Savage." Stoick said as he remembered.
"I'll do it!" Bucket volunteered.
"No offense, Bucket, but you didn't do a very good job with Heather." Mulch stated truthfully, trying not to offend his friend like he said. Bucket slumped his shoulders.
"All do it." Hiccup volunteered.
"Again?" Stoick asked.
"You really like to rub defeat in his face, don't ya?" Gobber said laughing and ruffling Hiccup's hair.
"He deserves it." Hiccup said fixing his hair and smiling. He took two plates of mutton and walked away towards the jail center.
"He's becoming like you more each day." Gobber said, elbowing Stoick in the side. Stoick smiled and continued his conversation with the others.