Everyone excited? New chapter! Yes, I know it's been two months...but did I promise speedy? Absolutely not! So enjoy!
"TOOTHLESS IS NOT A GIRL!"
The citizens outside the library looked in fear at the sky, thinking Odin was about to punish them. But the source of the roar was not heavenly; it was from a meek, skinny teenage boy. "No. No. NO!" He yelled. "Toothless is not a girl dragon! He will not have little Night Fury babies! He is male!" Toothless let out one of his shrieks in agreement. The walls trembled. "MALE! Do you hear me, fanfic writers?"
Hiccup grunted. "It's bad enough to make you human, but then a girl? Or worse, a human girl." He shook his head at his dragon. "And then you and I fall in love because it's so convenient, you're human now! Odin above. Always the Toothcup. Always!"
Stoick stuck his head in the door. "Son, are you alright? Gobber comes runnin' sayin' the library's bout to fall over…."
"Um. Fine, Dad. Just… reading."
"That fanfortune thing you young ones like to read?"
"Fanfiction. Yes."
"Alrigh', then." Stoick replied, and sailed out the door like a huge Viking ship.
The others jostled into the library just after Stoick, Tuffnut and Ruffnut arguing and hair pulling as usual, Snoutlout trying to talk to Astrid as usual, and Astrid ignoring him and trying to talk to Fishlegs about whether her Nadder's wingspan was shorter than most. The noise burst into Hiccup's mind all at once and he said "Hey, guys," as Toothless murmured his greeting.
Astrid waved the sack in her hand. "So the record-keeper gave us some scrolls in other languages."
"Really?" Hiccup tapped the ground and Astrid, with a certain measure of childish glee, poured out the scrolls. "So many," Ruffnut said, impressed. "What do you think they say?"
Snoutlout picked one up and predicted, "'Snoutlout is awesome.'"
"Orrrrr, 'Snoutlout is a toad,'" Ruffnut returned.
"Well, we have the character names to go by…" Fishlegs said logically.
It is quite likely that none of their predictions were right, but it is just as likely the writers of the said fanfics would have gotten a kick out of them.
Tuffnut frowned. "Musicals? Why would you sing about your life? 'Ooh, look I'm kicking my SISTERRRRRRR!'" He trilled as he kicked at her ribs. She dodged and sang back, "'I will break your face!'"
"Who writes a musical about cats anyway? What do they do? They meow, they eat, they sleep," Snoutlout said. "Though I get the feeling it's significantly improved by US being in it."
"Do you think it's related to the other one? I mean, Cats, Bye, bye Birdie…" Fishlegs wondered.
Astrid slingshot a ball of paper, formerly a fanfiction, into the fire. "I wish people wouldn't kill you!" She snapped to her boyfriend. "YOU ARE THE HERO HERE! You can't die! Odin above!"
"I do enjoy living," Hiccup agreed. "Which is why the emo-cutting-myself/suicide ones disturb me. I know my life sucked before, but really! I'm not going to try to die because of it! That's a bit extreme."
"Here's something a little more light-hearted," Fishlegs remarked. "In this we form a band."
"Like, singing-flute-whistles-lyres?"
"No…drums, guitars…I don't know what those are. Must be European or something. Anyway, we rock the Mead Hall."
"Aw," Astrid said before she realized she was speaking aloud. She reddened, unusual for her. "These are cute, is all!" she defended herself. Hiccup took it from her grasp. "Oh! This is about me when I was little. Are there a lot of these?"
"Yes, a fair amount."
"Well," Hiccup said. His eyes were soft with remembrance. "That's okay. This seems pretty accurate. And no dragon eats me. I'm satisfied."
"In some of them you meet and befriend Toothless earlier," Astrid said.
Hiccup smiled at his overgrown lizard, outside rolling in dragon nip with Stormfly and Horrorcow. "I don't mind that. But how would things be different if we had? Would the Dragon Peace have happened earlier? Hm."
Toothless, probably sensing Hiccup looking out at him, sat up and smiled toothlessly.
"You know, I've heard the phrase 'raised by dragons' but I didn't realize people took it literally," Ruffnut said. "A lot of fanfiction covers that topic."
"When you say heard the phrase, do you mean your mother told you and Tuff to stop acting like you've been raised by dragons?" Astrid questioned.
"Maybe," Ruffnut muttered.
Hiccup and the others grinned into their laps at the expressions on the twins' faces.
Hiccup was reading something that felt like, even thought it was fanfiction, reading a diary; he was reading stories about his parents. His dad. His mom. Them together, them apart. Them with him before she died. A part of him ached for his family reading him, but then he thought firmly that he had a family. Toothless. Stoick—Gobber— Astrid—Fishlegs—the twins, and even Snoutlout. He began to organize the scrolls and reached to read about Gobber's misadventures.
"What's prototype?"
"I don't know," Hiccup replied. "A game, obviously." He began reading. His body tensed the more he read unless he began to seem like a smoking volcano ready to erupt. The first chapter was okay. "Okay, um…I got bit by a bug and got a virus or something. It was…cancerous and everyone thought I was going to die. But I didn't…and my leg grew back…and now I'm really scary strong…and Gods, I'm whiny! ODIN! I just… killed a Zippleback, with my bare hands? And now I know everything it did….um, okay….this will eventually make sense…" He looked at his friends' puzzled expressions and shook his head. "Hopefully."
It did not. In the rest, he became a Zippleback (briefly), started have split personality disorder (at least, that's what he assumed when two voices spoke in his mind)… he yelled "GODS!" when the story-self got angry and hurt Toothless. "Would never happen," he growled. "Ever!" ….then he/ the other him killed/ absorbed a Monstrous Nightmare, then in an effort to save Toothless killed a ton of guys and liked it….at this point, Hiccup was livid. He unclenched his fingers from the paper and tore it into small shreds before burning them. He turned back to his friends and said as calmly as possible. "Anyone up for a ride?"
Hiccup and Astrid were the only ones left in the library. "Astrid, no," Hiccup said. "We are NOT reading them. Not! It's a terrible idea!"
"Oh, come on," she wheedled. "How bad can it be?"
"It's rated M, Astrid. About us. It can be bad."
"It's not like I'm twelve, Hiccup."
"Well, I'm going to read harmless future fics. You do what you want."
She obstinately began to read. She shuddered in less than five minutes, turned vampire-pale and shut the scroll. "You were right," she said faintly. She tossed the rest in the fire slowly and began to trudge out of the library. "No goodnight kiss?" Hiccup called after her.
"Not after that. I need to bathe. Vigorously."
Poor Astrid! I really got into some of my blood-boilers today: female Toothless; emo Hiccup; and good goodness, I read that prototype one and I knew I was gonna have to use it.
But just so everyone knows, I never want to offend anyone. These are my personal takes on what I think the characters would think.
As always, review me if you want to see something or if something really tickled you!
