She Was… Determined

Berk, like all other Viking islands, was almost unreasonably cold for most of the year. And Jack was extremely thankful for that. There was no way he could have stayed on Berk for as long as he did if the weather was like the European mainland. Jack didn't want to miss a single moment with his new friend. Well, his only friend.

It was already spring, which meant that he had been on Berk for almost six months. But he knew that soon, even Berk would get too hot for him, and he would have to leave. Only for a couple of weeks, but still, he would have to leave his friend, and go back to his lonely existence, all by himself.

Jack shook his head. He didn't want to think of that right then. He was focusing on Hiccup. She was down in her Viking village, being lonely, like always. He wanted to smile at how adorable she was being: running around, asking people if they needed help, doing something even if they said they didn't want her to do anything. But, he couldn't.

Jack hadn't had any friends up until that point. Ever. He didn't know that friends weren't all fun and games. They also made you… feel for them. He felt Hiccup's pain when she was hurting and her sadness when she was feeling especially horrible. It was unlike anything he had ever experienced before. It frightened him that someone so small could cause him all that pain. Still, if he could spend time with her, Jack would gladly accept all of her inner aching.

Jack looked down from the sky as a large girl with two red braids down her back pushed Hiccup into a rack of weapons, which set off an unfortunate series of events which ended up getting Dizzlebeard- the person Hiccup was trying to help- dumped into the freezing ocean. He leapt out of the water, and started screaming at Hiccup. Hiccup easily looked Dizzlebeard straight in the eye and smirked, saying,

"I know, good help these days. Impossible to find,"

Jack would have laughed at how purple Dizzlebeard's face was becoming- and it wasn't just because he was still soaking with the freezing ocean water. But Jack was too busy admiring his friend.

Hiccup was obviously hurt by Dizzlebeard's words. She got that dull look in her eyes, and she wasn't laughing like the dork she normally was. She was camouflaging her pain with a small fake smile, and a couple of sarcastic jokes. She was acting just like Jack. And Jack, of all people, knew just how hard it was to do that, to act like something didn't hurt. But at the end of the day, it was all an act. At the end of the day, it still hit you deep inside. At the end of the day, it was still the worst feeling in the world.

The next day Jack walked into town with Hiccup, who had gotten used to the idea that he could walk through everyone but her. Jack was shocked by the fact that she went right back to Dizzlebeard and insisted on helping him again. He was just as shocked by the fact that Dizzlebeard agreed.

Jack just shook his head. Vikings.

Jack had been confused the day Hiccup dragged him to her special cove for the first time.

He goes to create a small blizzard in America for two days, and suddenly he misses everything? He got back, and half of the village had been destroyed, Hiccup had been enrolled in dragon training, and suddenly, she didn't want to kill dragons anymore? Nothing really made sense to Jack anymore, so he had just decided to follow as quietly as he could behind Hiccup.

He stubbed his toe. Again.

"Ow! Ok, Hiccup, stop," he said, pulling her to a gentle halt, and then made her face him. She looked so… excited. He really hadn't seen her look like that unless she had perfected some weird new machine that had been particularly difficult for her to design. "What's going on?" he asked her quietly, resisting the urge to push away the lock of hair on her face.

"I can't really… explain," Hiccup said breathlessly. "I have to show you!"

Jack couldn't say no to those bright green eyes, so he found himself getting dragged through the woods, stubbing his toes at least three more times.

"Look!" She announced with a sense of awe and reverence in her voice. Jack leaned over the rock Hiccup was crouched on.

"Umm… this is a real nice cove, Hiccup," Jack said, still trying to see if there was something else Hiccup was trying to show him. "But I don't see any-" Jack turned his head to look at his pretty Viking friend, but sighed when he saw he was talking to thin air.

"Oh, Toothless!" she called from inside the cove. Jack snapped his head to look down. She was down there alright, with a basketful of fish. Were those raw fish?

Never mind that Jack thought to himself, how the Hel did she get down there so fast?

"I've got food!"

Jack cried out as a large black dragon stalked behind Hiccup's turned back.

"Hiccup!" he called, flying down to save her.

"Hmm?" she turned to face him and failed to notice the living shadow behind her. Jack got there just a second too late. The dragon pounced on Hiccup and pinned her to the ground. Jack held his staff in front of him, one flick of the wrist away from making the world's first dragon-sicle, when he heard Hiccup's laughter. He eased up and looked down. Hiccup was… smiling at the dragon? But… but… dragons were… not good! Right?

"Hiccup, what's going on?" Jack asked. The dragon got off of Hiccup, and she introduced the two of them.

"Jack, Toothless. Toothless, Jack,"

Jack looked at 'Toothless' preparing himself to tell Hiccup that her unbelievably dangerous pet wouldn't be able to see him. But, Jack was surprised. Yeah, Hiccup did that a lot. So why should her dragon be any different?

Toothless leaned forward, straight towards Jack's chest, and he started sniffing. After an awkward couple of seconds, Toothless pulled back and snorted at Hiccup before digging into his basket of fish. Jack turned to Hiccup, who was grinning sheepishly at him.

"Don't worry, he'll like you eventually."

Jack was on the ground, watching Hiccup fly with Toothless. At first he had tried to fly with them, but it seemed like his presence in the air just hindered Toothless's concentration. For whatever reason, Jack in the air, flying by himself, always freaked Toothless out. At first, Hiccup thought it was just because Toothless hadn't seen anything remotely human in the sky before. But after the fifteenth crash, Jack volunteered to stay on the ground.

It hadn't been Hiccup to ask him to stop flying with them. But, Jack knew her. She would have never asked. She would keep flying with him until she died. That was something that just made her Hiccup. Jack couldn't name it exactly, but he found it endearing.

A couple of weeks later, Jack and Hiccup walked to the cave together, trying to stay as silent as possible. They had run into Astrid earlier in the woods, and Hiccup wanted to make sure that the older girl didn't follow them. They walked through small streams, and mud, and the densest part of the forest to get to Toothless that day.

It was a long path, and it took almost an hour more than usual to get to Toothless. For once, Jack truly wished that he was human, because Hiccup carried about fifty pounds of smelly, heavy, raw fish on her back for an hour longer than she was used to. All to be absolutely certain that her friend was safe. That was when Jack realized what that endearing quality of was. Determination.

Hiccup wasn't stubborn. Stubborn made her sound close-minded and unappealingly… Viking. She wasn't just stuck in her ways because she wanted to be. She was determined. Because she worked hard for the things she believed in. And Jack liked that about her. Almost a little too much.

This story's going to be about ten chapters. In case ya'll wanted to count down, or know. I got four reviews, which is more than I thought this story would get. Thanks for the follows, favorites, and reviews :)