Chapter 3:
Savage muttered to himself angrily as he trekked through the Berk undergrowth towards the village, sent as a scout by Alvin the Treacherous to see how effective the Berkians' defences were. The treacherous Outcast leader and six other Outcasts, including Savage, had landed on Berk in the dead of the night last night, sneaking inland to camp out and make a new plan to capture the Dragon Conqueror. However, ever since Savage had accidentally let a dragon escape from the Outcast dragon arena back on Outcast Island a few days ago, Alvin had given him all the worse jobs. He had to scrub the dragons' stalls, even though that was never done on account of the Outcasts not caring if the dragons wallowed in their own filth; he was sent to capture any really dangerous dragons, like the Whispering Death he had barely managed to catch the other day for the dragon arena, and now, Savage was forced to go through the enemy lines to spy on the Chief's house to navigate any sneaky, quiet ways to get past Stoick the Vast and the Dragon Conqueror's dragon, the Night Fury, and capture Hiccup without a fuss.
Finally, he arrived, but not where he expected. Instead of coming out of the forest near the Chief's house, Savage had apparently become so distracted with his annoyance with his leader that he had turned himself around and in the direction of the docks. Just as he was about to head away though, Savage heard snatches of a conversation that instantly froze him in place.
"My son has disappeared at sea... find him... will travel by boat to search the waters... rest of you will fly with me..." It was Stoick's voice. Savage chuckled to himself darkly.
"Oh, Alvin needs to hear this," he muttered, planning on telling the treacherous Outcast leader about the disappearance of the Dragon Conqueror.
Savage was still out of breath when he finally arrived back at the Outcast camp, having run straight there and immediately informing Alvin what he had learned.
"So, the boy's missing, eh?" Alvin laughed. "I'd expect nothing else from that little runt. So weak."
"So... should we follow them?" asked Savage warily, having gotten his breath back but not wanting to make Alvin more angry with him than he already was.
"Hmm? Oh, ah, very well," Alvin said after a pause, for he hadn't thought of following the Berkian search party to find Hiccup first. "Pack up your things! We're heading on a little field trip!" he commanded.
Two minutes later, they had set sail in a small rowing boat after the Berkian ship, which could still be seen sailing north, away from Berk. Of course, Alvin had his men row the boat, as he didn't want to be huffing and puffing by the time he captured the Dragon Conqueror.
Meanwhile, back on Sunset Island, Hiccup woke up from his slumber by Beck's fireplace. He groggily opened his eyes and clutched the blanket he was under-
-wait, blanket? Fireplace? Where in Odin's name was he?
Hiccup quickly shot up straight and had a look around. He seemed to be in a small cottage-like house, built of stones stacked together with a ladder poking through the ceiling, presumably leading to an upper floor. There were two chairs that must have been stuffed with sheep wool on either side of the fireplace, a table stood in a corner of the room covered in pots, pans and other kitchen utensils and there was a pair of boots, a worn tunic and a pair of pants lying next to him. I must be dreaming, he thought. Last thing I remember is washing up on an island's shore.
Suddenly, the front door of the strange house creaked open, and a tall, thin girl with dark brown hair, brown eyes, light brown skin and threadbare brown clothes walked in, carrying three chicken eggs. Hiccup felt a rush of fear at the stranger and as quietly as he could, crawled away from the fireplace and behind one of the stuffed chairs.
Beck furrowed her brow thoughtfully as she approached the fireplace. The boy wasn't there. Had he woken up while she had left to do her daily farming responsibilities, and run away? Just then, she saw a boot sticking out from behind one of her mother's favourite stuffed chairs. Upon seeing it, however, the boot quickly scuttled out of view.
Beck chuckled to herself. He was hiding? Why? "Excuse me, you can come out now," she informed him.
Slowly, ever so slowly, the boy peered around the chair he was hiding behind and Beck got a good look at the fear etched on his face when his gaze fell on her favourite sword, which she still clutched in her hand after using it to dispatch a wolf that was intent on eating her sheep. "It's okay," she reassured him in a soft voice. "I'm not here to hurt you."
Hiccup sucked in his breath when he heard the girl speak to him. He was found! Slowly, he looked warily around the corner and spotted the sharp looking sword she held in her hand. He was in a strange house with a strange girl with a weapon! Then the girl seemed to notice his fear and said, "It's okay. I'm not here to hurt you."
"Wh-who are you?" Hiccup stammered. "And where am I?"
The girl smiled at him. "My name's Rebecca, but you can call me Beck. You're on Sunset Island, and you're in my house. What's your name?"
The boy seemed to relax as crept back to the fireplace, suddenly cold. "I'm Hiccup. I come from Berk, where my father is the chief. I was on a flying with my dragon, Toothless, when the storm came in and lightning struck Toothless' tail. I fell into the ocean, got picked up by a Scauldron, and swam here," he said. Hiccup was a bit surprised that Beck didn't look shocked at him mentioning flying a dragon.
"You're from Berk? That's where..." here she trailed off, eyeing a carefully drawn map on the wall of Berk, its surrounding islands, and in the top left corner of the paper, the small shape that was Sunset Island.
"That's where what?" asked Hiccup, curious.
Beck recovered from her slip and turned back to Hiccup. "Nothing. I'm just kind of surprised you made it all the way here, since it's pretty far from Berk. Are you hungry?"
"Yes, please," Hiccup replied, hearing his stomach groan from not eating since, well, yesterday's lunch. How long had he been away, exactly? "Hey, how long was I asleep?"
"You've been out like a light since last night, and it's about midday now," Beck said while carefully flipping some eggs on a pan over the fireplace.
"Wow, really?" Hiccup said with a sigh. He was going to be so dead when his father found out that he had been so reckless.
"Yup," commented Beck cheerfully as she fetched a couple of plates and put one a half eggs on each of them. "Bon appetit."
Hiccup settled into the eggs heartily, then paused and looked around, confused as to why there wasn't other people in the house. Beck couldn't be living by herself, could she? "Beck, does anyone else live here?" he asked cautiously.
Beck paused with a mouthful of egg halfway to her mouth. "Well, yes," she admitted, putting the fried egg back down. "My parents died seven years ago, and I have no siblings."
"Oh..." was all Hiccup could say. He had thought that maybe the girl's parents were out getting food, or maybe she had an older sibling looking after her, but apparently Beck had had to fend for herself. The silence went on for so long that Hiccup jumped when Beck continued.
"It was a Scauldron attack," she said, fully ignoring her lunch by now. "They didn't know that they had stumbled upon its egg on the beach until it was too late."
"I'm sorry," Hiccup said, fully meaning it. He'd lost his mother at a young age, but he couldn't remember anything about her except her smile, and Beck must have had plenty of memories of her parents before she'd lost them, so it must hurt more than he could imagine.
"Don't be," she said now, toughening up. She reminded him of Astrid, Hiccup realized. "Do you want me to show you around?" she asked, getting up from the table and grabbing her cloak.
"Sure, why not," Hiccup replied, having wondered how Beck had gotten the three chicken eggs she'd cooked.
