I apologize in advance for how boring this chapter is. I was just proof reading and thought it to be very boring.
Hiccup woke up in the middle of the night, a cold sweat laid on his brow. The only light in the room came from the hearth of the fire place. He took in a deep breath, feeling the dull pain in his rib cage, and let it out. He couldn't wait for that pain to go away.
He turned his head to his left, wincing at the slight headache he had, and saw Astrid was under the covers with her back turned to him. She was resting, and he hoped peacefully.
He needed to get out of bed. No, he wanted to get out of bed. He felt foolish for allowing himself to get this way. His father wouldn't have gotten himself so beat up, nor would he have been held up as long as he had been.
The question that was still remaining on his mind: How had they escaped? He couldn't remember. Or, his brain was forcing him not to remember. Too much traumatic stress, between the physical beatings, the yelling, and the stress of trying to get back home on a broken tail. Somehow he had managed to block out a lot of the events.
What he did know, was that he had been captured, he and Toothless had escaped, but he still didn't know how. Those thoughts weren't coming to him. Shaking his head, he decided that didn't matter yet. What did matter, was that he get himself something to eat for his raging stomach.
Pushing himself up with his good arm, he took a gentle note of the bad. He groaned, and tried to shake his head of the horrible memory of how he received that injury. The slightest movements made him feel very weak. Lack of food is what he chalked that up to be.
He threw his leg over the side of the bed, followed by his other. Oh, crap. The prosthetic was gone. He forgot the foot of it had snapped off with the saddle. He sighed. Again, taking into account that he was very weak from lack of food, still naked and the fact that his prosthetic was gone, he turned to look at Astrid. He debated on waking her up.
With his stomach angrily telling him it was far past time to eat, he couldn't wait for Astrid to get up. Food was a must at this point.
Allowing himself to sit up against his pillows, reached his hand over to her shoulder, and gently touched it. She darted up almost instantly. The worry on her face, the exhaustion that shown nearly killed him. He felt guilty instantly for waking her up.
"Morning," she said quietly, once she had calmed down a little bit. "You look awake."
He nodded. He gave her a weak smile.
She scooted closer to him and touched his forehead, feeling the cold sweat. He saw a look of relief come across her face. "Your fever feels like it finally broke." Her voice sounded relieved as well.
"Yes, but I am terribly hungry," he said quietly. His voice still felt weak. Just then his stomach growled, and it was loud.
Astrid smiled, giving a small chuckle. "I'll get you something light to eat. How about some toast?"
A few hours following, Hiccup had found some energy to try to stand on his own. His mother was having a complete fit over it.
"You really should stay in bed a little longer," she said to him. Instead of pushing him back to bed like she had intended, he instead decided to use her as a crutch. He reached for her shoulder and hobbled over towards his work bench. When she didn't follow, he used Toothless, who was excited he was up and moving, to finalize his way over to his chair. Once he made it over, he looked at her with a satisfied grin.
"What am I ever going to do with you?" she asked herself. She then pulled him closer to his bed by the back of his chair, while he protested. "You can stay in your chair—flip yourself around—there. I am going to look over some of these bruises and change some of your bandaging—"
"Really?" he groaned. He decided to make himself comfortable. He put his good arm over the back of the chair, and then rested his chin on top. He felt his mother peeling away some bandages from his back, looking over some cuts and bruises.
He was mildly embarrassed still. At least his father wasn't there to mend all of the mess up. That he was relieved for, just ever so slightly.
"Where's Astrid at?" Hiccup asked his mother.
"Never you mind," she said quietly. "Let's just get this scab cleaned up a little bit."
Hiccup sighed. He felt panic run through his body very briefly over the mentioning of the burn. He had to take a breath and remind himself that he would only get better from this point on. It would just take some time. Letting out a sigh, his rib ached again. "This is getting old."
Astrid was vomiting in a basin downstairs. Her anxiety and worry had finally gotten the best of her physically. Her stomach twisted again, and she expelled her stomach acid into the basin again. She hoped she wasn't going to start dry heaving. She knew when she was done she needed to eat something. She couldn't remember the last thing she had to eat, honestly.
A knock came at the door.
"Why—Why!" she yelled violently. "It's barely dawn!"
Just as she was wiping the vomit from her mouth with the back of her hand, Snotlout and Fishlegs came in.
"What happened to you?" asked Snotlout. "Did you two lovebirds get into a fight or something?"
Astrid was ready to deck him. She knew he was referring to the dark circles under her eyes. She was in need to a decent night's sleep.
"I wish," she said to Snotlout. "Can't you doe-does even let someone let you into the house?"
"You were taking too long," Snotlout said obnoxiously.
Fishlegs was actually just tiptoeing inside the house, shutting the door behind himself.
Astrid poured herself some fresh water and took a small drink from the cup. She wished they had held off coming over for at least another five minutes. Enough time to collect herself, and to not barge in and interrupt Hiccup—Oh, no, Hiccup!
"What do you guys need?" she asked, getting up.
"Where have you been at?" Snotlout asked. "You haven't been out."
"Didn't Gobber already tell you that I was ill?" she asked. "I mean, I just got done vomiting into a bucket."
"We heard a rumor that Hiccup's home," said Fishlegs.
Astrid choked on her water. "WHO TOLD YOU THAT?"
Fishlegs cowered slightly. "Eret."
"When did he tell you that?"
Fishlegs hid behind his hands as Astrid earnestly got into his face over the mentioning of Eret.
"In the Great Hall….A-At breakfast."
Well, he lied to you!" she said. "Why—why would someone—"
"Astrid—" His voice came gently.
Snotlout, Fishlegs and Astrid turned to look up at the loft. Hiccup was leaning against the banister with his mother's support. Even fifteen feet above them, both Fishlegs and Snotlout could see Hiccup was physically impaired.
"Come on up, guys," he said quietly. "We have a lot of talking to do."
Hiccup settled himself back into his chair. Astrid took a seat on the bed, and as Valka walked out of the room, she grabbed half of the loaf of bread that Hiccup hadn't finished, handed it to Astrid and mouthed "Eat." She then turned and walked down the stairs leaving the group to chat.
"Hiccup—what happened to you?" Fishlegs began.
"Well—"
"What kind of dragon made these?" Snotlout cried, pointing to the bruising and gashed on Hiccup's shoulder.
"I bet it was a Terrible Terror!" cried Fishlegs.
"No—it wasn't, guys, it was—"
"A Typhomerange!" cried Snotlout.
"No, guys—"
"A Skulldron couldn't have done this," said Fishlegs, looking at the mark on Hiccup's hip.
"It wasn't a dragon," Hiccup said, a little more loudly. He was suddenly getting more of his voice back.
"I bet one of those creepy crawlers finally got their nails into you, didn't they, Hiccup?" cried Snotlout. "I knew you would find one you couldn't work with."
"No, Snotlout—"
Both Snotlout and Fishlegs were making Astrid and Hiccup rather dizzy. Astrid finally had enough.
"Would you two muttin-heads just shut up!" Astrid said.
Snotlout and Fishlegs seemed taken aback.
Valka had entered the room, holding two mugs of warm Yak's milk in her hands. She gently handed them both to Hiccup and Astrid. She sighed heavily.
"It was Dagur," Valka said quietly.
"Dagur?!" cried Fishlegs.
"Yes," Hiccup said after he blew a little bit on his warm milk. He was hoping he could swallow this down a little easier. The bread he had eaten earlier wasn't going down his still raw throat too well. "Thanks, Mom." She was leaving the room again. He received a courtesy nod before she disappeared back down to the kitchens.
"So, what happened?" Snotlout asked quietly. He had decided to take a seat on the floor, and so did Fishlegs. Astrid had taken a seat on the bed, sitting with her legs tucked into herself.
"He escaped somehow," Hiccup said. He spaced out a little bit. "Astrid—how long have I been home?"
Astrid let out a sigh. "About four days." Silence filled the room. Hiccup seemed surprised he was home that long. "When we had that awful storm."
"What?!" cried Snotlout. "He's been home that long and we were just told today?!"
Astrid nodded. "We didn't want to alarm the village. Only people who knew were Gothi, Eret, and Gobber."
"Eret knew that whole time!" cried Snotlout. "Why?"
"Don't you worry about it," Astrid said to him coldly. She did feel guilty about not letting their friends know Hiccup was back. Especially now, seeing the looks on their faces.
Snotlout went to say something else, but Toothless had come up from his slab and shoved his own snout into Snotlout's, giving him a look that stopped him from speaking again.
"Guys, we need to keep everyone out on patrol, especially at night," he said. "No one is to come within 2 miles of the island. Not even Trader Yohann. I want all ships inspected coming to the island prior to arrival. No one gets in without my approval."
"You are serious," said Fishlegs, surprised at Hiccup's extra measures to protect the island.
"I am," Hiccup said to him. "He has escaped his prison. He's madder than ever. Make sure any of the ships that need to go out for fish are protected. Help them if you have to. I don't want anyone on this island to get hurt." He took a small sip of his milk and sighed. "Judging by the damage he's done to me, I don't want anyone alone with him on this island."
"What else?" asked Snotlout.
"We will sit low," Hiccup said. "For all I know is that Dagur probably thinks I died out at sea. May even think Toothless did as well. He knows we didn't fly away; not with the saddle in pieces like it was."
"Even if the saddle hadn't been in pieces, do you think you would have been able to fly Toothless back?" Astrid asked. "You were pretty out of it."
Hiccup shrugged his good shoulder. "I can't really say. I could have, I would have gotten father sooner than in that boat."
"Wait—you came back in a boat?" asked Fishlegs.
Hiccup nodded.
"How many men do you think he has?" asked Astrid.
"I'm more concerned about how many dragons he has," said Fishlegs. "If he took over the island it's possible—"
"I wasn't able to go investigate and find out, Fishlegs." Hiccup reached over the touched Toothless's head. "I don't really know what to expect. I wasn't able to freely move around the place before we were shot down. We were taken completely by surprise. Nothing looked—abnormal until we had a net to knock us down."
Images were creeping into his mind, beginning to engulf him. The iron rod, the beating he had taken previously…and then the face of a man with a scar on his face—
He felt a hand on his back, knocking the images away. It was Astrid bringing him back to reality. His arms had goosebumps on them, and the hair on the back of his neck was standing up.
"Tell the Twins and the A Team to look after the boat and protect the island. Fishlegs, I expect you to form some type of schedule. No one is to go past the sea stacks—just us and the A Team."
Fishlegs nodded. "I'll get right to work."
Astrid went to head out with Fishlegs and Snotlout to help them, but Hiccup grabbed her hand and pulled her back towards him with the slightest effort.
"Where do you think you are off to?" he asked her.
"They need help—"
"They will be fine, Astrid," he said.
"The more people out on patrol the better," Astrid said. "If Dagur—"
Hiccup put his hand up to hush her. She stopped when she saw tears gathering up in his eyes. He was seriously looking at her. Finally, he spoke to her.
"You are exhausted, Astrid. You look tired, and I know you haven't been eating. So, do this for me. Stay home at least for today, and rest. I know you want to get out there and help. But, do me this favor and rest yourself. Then, if you feel up to it, go out tomorrow, okay?"
She sighed and nodded. "Okay." She stood up and gave him a squeeze from where he sat. He wrapped his good arm around her waist and leaned against her stomach with his head just slightly.
"Do me a favor, would you?" she asked him.
"What's that, milady?" he asked.
"Don't leave Berke without back up again, okay?"
He took a deep breath and sighed. She was right. He should have had someone there with him when it was all said and done. But, he thought it would be safe. He was glad she hadn't been there. With both of them at Outcast Island, they both would have been in some trouble together.
"I won't," he said to her.