"It's time." The doctor said this calmly. She was standing in the middle of the operating room. Her fellow doctors were stationed at other parts of the room, ready to begin the procedure.
Toothless was called for. He and Hiccup walked into the room. They were both extremely nervous and for the same reasons.
The doctors had been informed of Hiccup's intention to stay during the operation, but the head doctor wanted to be sure. "Are you certain you can handle this? Operations aren't fun to watch."
Hiccup smiled slightly. "Yes, I'm sure." He wasn't planning on watching the actual operation anyway. He just wanted to sit by Toothless's head and wait. It was the least he could do.
Toothless purred softly. He hopped onto the operating table without prompting. The actual table he was sitting on had been brought from storage and was a bulky construct of iron. It had to be to support his weight. He arranged himself so that his tail was laid out flat on the actual operating table, which was adjacent to his table, and settled down into a sleeping posture.
Hiccup sat on the table next to him and smiled down at the Night Fury, whose head was just below his elbow. "This is going to turn out fine. I'll be here the whole time." He started gently scratching behind the dragon's ears.
The doctor approached, with an oversized face mask they had custom-designed in the last few days. She gently placed it over Toothless's nose and mouth. "Breath in, and relax."
Toothless did as he was told, and almost immediately fell into a deep sleep. It was so deep his claws didn't even twitch while he slept.
The doctor checked Toothless's vital signs. "He's out. We've got six hours. Let's move." She watched officiously as one of the other doctors wheeled in the vat and its contents.
That was when Hiccup stopped watching. He had no desire to see them cut Toothless's tail open, even if it was for a good cause. He tried to ignore the sounds, and concentrate on his sleeping friend's face. It was hard, but he managed. He spent the next few hours imagining Toothless flying with both tailfins. It was something he had thought he would never get to see.
Iris was slightly panicking. "Of all days, he shows up now?! When our entire medical staff is in the middle of performing surgery on a dragon? That's the day the President picks to visit?!" Her carefully devised plan was falling out of the window.
Skyler nodded numbly. She had just got out of communications with the President. He'd be there in under half an hour. The surgery was going to last at least three more hours, probably more like five.
Iris made a decision. "Skyler, go tell everyone. No one goes into the operating room, no matter what. Don't even tell anyone in there what's happening. They don't need the distraction. We're going to keep the President out of the South wing entirely. And tell everyone to remember what we'll be saying, and what we won't!" She prepared the big meeting room, and hurriedly edited some of her planned presentations. Obviously, the President was going to expect some rushed status update, given the time he thought he was giving her to work with, but Iris had plenty of forewarning. She forced herself to calm down, and prepare to withhold quite a bit of the truth from the one person who was capable of shutting them down on a whim. He'd only been in office for a few weeks, why was he doing this now? It didn't matter. She was prepared.
President Teller whistled appreciatively as the motorcade stopped in front of the bunker entrance. The bunker was in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness, and only reachable by a gravel road. It wasn't at all impressive from the outside. Just a small and squat dome. But he knew a bit about what was there, so he was still impressed.
"Alright boys, this is as far as you go." Teller was enjoying the rare privilege of leaving his ever-present security behind. Even they didn't have the clearance for this. Besides, what danger could lurk inside a hidden bunker filled with weedy scientists? He was probably going to be the only person there with any muscle whatsoever. Not that he was particularly strong, but at least he worked out. These guys probably never saw the light of day. Besides, he wasn't going alone. He turned to the other person in the car. "Ready to see what this team has been doing?"
The man in the car was somewhat short and squat. He had far more fat than muscle and looked as a whole decidedly unhealthy. But he was a personal friend of Teller's and a moderately experienced geneticist. Teller figured the only struggling team in the project couldn't refuse some extra help, whether or not Professor Morian was exactly up to their standards. Besides, he owed Morian a favor, and a cushy job in a bunker seemed like a pretty good one.
Morian scoffed. "Whatever these so-called geniuses have scraped up to show us. You could at least have given them time to prepare some half-decent exaggerations." He was of a low opinion of any project that reported nothing but 'investigating alternative solutions'.
Teller chided him. "It's not a very good idea to think so badly of your future colleagues."
The two men stepped out of the car and approached the bunker door. It opened as they did. Teller smiled charmingly as he saw a young woman of apparently somewhat Spanish descent standing inside the doorway. "Ah, would you be miss Skyler Hermanez?" He didn't pay much attention to the exchange of names and qualifications, though he saw the woman eying Morian almost suspiciously. He didn't tell her why Morian was here, and Morian said nothing beyond introducing himself.
The group stood inside the bunker, and Skyler shut the blast doors. Once it was entirely sealed, the whole floor began descending. The bunker was built with security in mind, and this was the only way down. It took a full minute for the floor to reach the ground level. Skyler led the two men to a nearby meeting room.
Teller was slightly disappointed. The other teams had given tours. Still, he supposed this team didn't really have anything to give a tour of. They weren't building anything. Their job was on the cellular level.
He and Morian sat down at the table. There were already about fifteen or so scientists seated there.
Skyler took a seat at one edge of the table. Far away from Morian. She noticed the other scientists glance at him skeptically, and possibly a bit nervously. He was an unknown factor, one they weren't anticipating.
Iris began her presentation. It was a patchwork collection of vague statements, half-truths, cover-ups, and downright lies. She gave the impression that the team was still looking for ways around the genetic impossibilities of redesigning the human body to be radiation-resistant. She had used the old ideas and suggestions for this part and neglected to explain that every proposed possible solution had already been proven impossible or impractical. This was the presentation they would have been giving if Hiccup and Toothless hadn't been discovered. But it would have been a lot less downright cover-up and more wishful thinking back then.
It went off without a hitch. President Teller looked entirely impressed, and Iris was already inwardly celebrating when he stood.
"Well, this seems quite promising, despite the setbacks. I must say, I think this is the most ambitious of all the projects."
Iris smiled. He had no idea just how ambitious it really was.
Then Teller continued, and she had to fight to keep the smile on her face. "I have actually brought you some extra help, in the form of Professor Morian here. He will be happy to assist you in this endeavor." He gestured to Morian, who declined to stand. "On that note, I saw that your team has recently expanded, with the addition of two new scientists. Which of you are the newest members?" He looked around. "Actually, are some of you missing? I distinctly recall there being twenty-two of you total now. Twenty-three, with the addition of Morian."
Iris thought fast. "Yes, actually. One of our two new members had a somewhat major medical emergency. The group's doctors are dealing with that as we speak. They are actually in surgery at the moment. Our other new member is in there with them. It isn't life-threatening, but it couldn't wait either. They had just started when we received word of your visit." She would deal with the unwelcome addition of Morian once the President left.
Teller sighed. "Well, tell them I said hello. What are they experts of, anyway?"
Iris struggled to keep a straight face. "They are both experts in Zoology. We decided some insight into natural defense mechanisms and animal traits would be useful to have. They've already been extremely helpful."
Teller seemed to accept this. "Well, good luck all of you." He left the room, escorted by a very nervous Skyler. She wasn't normally a nervous person but deceiving the President of the United States was apparently getting to her.
Once they had left, Iris turned slowly to Professor Morian, who was sitting there looking bored. And snobbish. But that seemed to be a constant for him. Quite a contrast to the mostly fit and fairly young group of scientists he had just been added to. "So, care to introduce yourself at all?" She tried to keep the hostility out of her tone, but just a bit slipped through.
Morian grunted. "I suppose you would be the one in charge around here?" He said that mockingly. "And what qualifications do you have, little girl?"
Iris bristled. She was nearly twenty-six, how dare he call her a little girl! "I have a masters in biology, and I spent quite a while assisting in running this very project before our last team leader passed away suddenly. Not to mention it was a unanimous decision among the team to have me promoted when that happened. I lead by qualifications and by popular support. And if you intend to stay, that means you follow my orders. Got it?"
Morian smirked. "Calm down girl. And I am here officially in an advisory capacity, so I do not report to you. We can discuss this later. Suppose you tell me where my room is right now, and I'll speak to you later."
Iris really wished Toothless wasn't unconscious on the operating table right now. She would have loved to introduce Morian to him, teeth and all. Then again, Morian clearly planned on staying a while... "Certainly. Your room, I'm sorry to say, will have to be in the North wing. Our rooms in the South wing are all occupied at the moment. There are exactly twenty-two of them. I'm sure Abdul and Skyler can help you with that. Maybe the storage room next to the one we just recently started using?"
Abdul smirked as he got the message. That would be the empty room right next to Toothless's fish storage area. Far from anyone else in the bunker, and sure to smell of fish. "Certainly. We do have a few spare cots, I'll go put one in there."
Morian did not look pleased with this turn of events, but he realized objecting when Iris was being the picture of hospitality would make him look bad. He didn't seem to realize absolutely none of the scientists could think any less of him after the way he had treated Iris. To them, he served as an unwelcome reminder that their group was special in both quality of intelligence and character. He represented all that was wrong with most scientists and politicians. Rude, arrogant, narrow-minded, and lazy.
He slowly moved out of the room, following Abdul. Iris sent two of the sneakier scientists to make sure Morian didn't wind up anywhere near the operating room when they wheeled Toothless back to his room to recover.
She addressed the remaining portion of the group, which now included Skyler. "What the hell are we going to do with him?"
A female scientist spoke up. "Can't we just kick him out?"
Skyler responded. "Nope. He'd waddle crying to the President, and that'd bring us way too much attention." She smirked.
Iris laughed darkly. "I'm tempted to just introduce him to Toothless once he wakes up. Or even Hiccup, with that sword of his. But then we'd have to deal with the body. And no matter how repugnant and insulting he is, I don't think we should kill him. And I highly doubt he would understand or agree with our real goal."
Another scientist responded to that. "So we can't kill him, we can't force him to leave... can we just ignore him and hope he gets bored and leaves on his own?"
Someone scoffed. "Look at him. he clearly just wants a cushy hiding spot for the end of the world. He looks like a bureaucratic scientist, the kind that makes a living swarming on every spelling mistake in scientific discoveries." They didn't know it, but that actually was exactly what Morian wanted, and what he did for a living.
There was a general rumble of discontent in the room. No one knew how to deal with this new issue.
Then Skyler spoke up. "Can we just intimidate him? He seems like someone who'd be easily frightened. Give him an enemy, someone to scare him off, but make it embarrassing enough that he won't tell the President why he left."
Iris nodded. "That might work. But who?" She looked around the room. "We aren't exactly an intimidating group, and Toothless obviously can't do this."
Someone spoke up. "What about Hiccup? He's fought in a war or two and is missing a leg. He could probably scare Morian. And he would have a great source of motivation. Morian is a direct threat to his best friend." They laughed. "He might not even need his sword."
Iris nodded. Hiccup wasn't the intimidating type, but Morian didn't know that. That could work.
The scientists scattered. Some of them were going to hide incriminating evidence of their real activities. Others were going to pull up pieces of the old experiments. And the rest were going to make sure Morian didn't step within eyeshot of the medical bay or operating room.
That last group need not have bothered. It took Morian several hours to get his spare room arranged as he wanted, even with Abdul's (intentionally inefficient) assistance. He was understandably quite annoyed when he finally made it to the cafeteria for a late lunch.
Iris was there at that moment. She wasn't eating and was instead checking her watch. She had stationed someone outside the operating room, ready to go in the moment they were done and inform them of the situation. They'd wheel Toothless to his room, and then, for dramatic effect...
The doors swung open. Iris watched Morian's face as the three doctors entered, still in their bloodstained medical gear. It enhanced the effect that apparently dragon blood was a subtly deeper shade of red, making even the slightest stain look gruesome. It was completely against medical practice to do this, but the doctors didn't mind, once informed of the situation. Morian's face was turning an unhealthy shade of white. He looked nauseous.
The head doctor smiled tiredly. "I'm happy to announce that Mr. Fury will make a complete recovery, though it took longer than we were expecting. His bones were unexpectedly difficult to graft back together. That took two of us, one for each end." That was the complete truth, and the head doctor really was as tired as she looked.
Morian abruptly ran for the nearest trash can. He missed the doctors leaving, and the general cheer their announcement elicited from the rest of the cafeteria.
A minute later, Morian was back in his seat, though he wasn't eating anymore. He had a very angry and still slightly sick expression.
Iris smirked. Perfect. Hiccup had apparently been quite eager to play his part, once the messenger had told him what was going on. She was surprised he had waited this long.
The doors opened again, and this time Morian flinched slightly. Hiccup walked in, with a deceptively pleasant expression on his face. He apparently absent-mindedly took a piece of bread from the kitchen area and sat down across from Morian.
Morian looked affronted at that. "And who exactly are you?" He sniffed as he said this, taking in the fact that Hiccup couldn't have been a day over twenty-two by his apparently youthful appearance.
Hiccup smiled politely. "Haddock." He held his hand out. When Morian reluctantly took it, he shook it vehemently. Morian actually winced as he pulled his hand away.
Iris took in Hiccup's genuinely surprised expression. He really must not have intended that to hurt. She probably should have warned him how soft unfit political scientists could be. He was used to Vikings or young, moderately fit people. Still, that didn't hurt the impression he was trying to make.
"What kind of name is that?"
Hiccup laughed. "Better than my first name. And you would be?"
Morian seemed unsettled by Hiccup's complete lack of response to his insult. "Professor Morian. Geneticist."
Hiccup smiled disarmingly. "Oh, do you have a masters in genetics, like Abdul?" He knew very well thanks to a quick internet search by one of the doctors that Morian did not.
Morian scowled. "I have forty years of experience in the field."
"Forty years of experience? A lot must have changed in that time. I don't think anything but the last ten years really counts at this point. progress makes everything past that obsolete. Especially in a field like genetics." Hiccup had learned well in the time he spent catching up on the last thousand years. Especially since he had done extra reading after the true nature of the project had been revealed, mostly into genetics. He was fairly well versed in the basics, enough to bluff his way along.
Morian was getting really annoyed now. "And who would you be to tell me that? A zoologist has no room to talk about a much more difficult and complex subject."
Hiccup idly moved the piece of bread he had brought over as he responded, his voice deceptively cheerful. "I'm not just a zoologist. I also work with my hands. I build things. Tools, equipment, weapons..." That last one was said with a slightly darker smile.
Morian blanched ever so slightly. "Weapons? What kind of scientist builds weapons as a hobby?" He seemed genuinely offended at the idea.
Hiccup pulled out the hilt of Inferno. "Not guns, more impractical things. In this day and age, anyway. A thousand years ago, this thing would have been pretty intimidating. It still is now, but it wouldn't be much help against a gun." He startled Morian immensely by triggering the blade.
Morian scooted his chair back at that. "You have one with you?! Here?!" He was a coward at heart, and the idea that someone around him was armed and dangerous did not sit well with him.
Hiccup nodded. "Never know when you'll need a collapsible blade that can light itself on fire." He retracted the blade and put the hilt away. "So, what are you doing here?" His voice was for the first time entirely serious, and not at all absent-minded. "Because we don't need you."
Morian was at this point completely off-balance, and Hiccup's sudden change in demeanor unnerved him entirely. "I'm a geneticist. Why wouldn't I be here?"
Hiccup scowled. "Because we already have more than three geneticists, all of whom are far more qualified than you. And you don't seem at all interested in actually working with our team leader. So, why are you really here?"
Morian regained a bit of confidence as he remembered who had gotten him into this bunker. "The President assigned me to advise because this team is currently failing." He said that with a sneer. "I think personally that you might be overpaid. I can have the President look at your salary if you like?" That was said menacingly.
Hiccup looked puzzled. He turned towards Iris's table and called out to her. "Iris, am I getting paid? I honestly have no idea."
Iris, who had been discretely following the conversation, tried to answer with a straight face. "Other than room and board, not really. I think I set you up to get minimum wage because that was the lowest setting the computer accepted."
Hiccup laughed. "Fine by me." He turned back to Morian. "Still think I'm overpaid?"
Morian was at a loss for words. What kind of person didn't even know if they were making money at their own job? Not just that he didn't know, he seemed to not even care if he was working for free! "Why are you here?" That was said in a tone of utter confusion, with none of Morian's usual snobbery.
Hiccup smiled. "I believe in what we're doing, and I have some very specific knowledge that can help. Far more than anything you could contribute. You should request a transfer, maybe to teams four, five, six, or seven. They probably could use a mediocre geneticist to sort through the records." That was the end-goal of this. Those teams might actually be able to use Morian, as their job required more time than exceptional talent. And Morian would be safely away from the secrets of team nine.
Morian wasn't sure how to respond. He knew very well that if he transferred over there, he would actually have to work. Here, he had thought to get away with some fairly useless and sporadic 'advice' while he waited out his dim-witted friend Teller's inevitable failure to defuse the massive mess the world had become. He wouldn't give up what he was sure would be a life of relative luxury just because some weird Zoologist told him to. "I think not. Now, if you'll excuse me." He moved to get up.
Hiccup stood as he did. He intentionally took a heavy step forward, drawing Morian's eyes to his prosthetic leg. He met Morian's stare as he looked up. "It was bitten off. Interestingly enough, that was done in order to save my life. I would have burned alive if I hadn't been pulled by the leg to safety." He neglected to mention the fact that they were both in free-fall at the time, or who had done the biting. Let Morian assume what he wanted.
Morian paled. He left the cafeteria without another word. Hiccup went to the door after a moment and made sure Morian was heading to the North wing, and his makeshift room. He returned to the cafeteria.
Iris started clapping. "Quite the performance."
Hiccup grimaced. "Not really my style, intimidating people, but from what I heard he deserved it." The messenger had also told Hiccup how Morian had treated Iris, though Iris hadn't told him to relay that. "What next? I don't think he's just going to transfer."
Abdul, who was sitting at a nearby table, smiled as he answered that question. "Any time you aren't with Toothless in the next few weeks, find Morian. Hang around, make sure he knows you are around... all the time, randomly. Basically, make sure he remembers exactly who else is in the bunker with him. But try to make it look unintended, if possible."
Iris added to that with a faint smile of her own. "You did great in making him uncomfortable. Your presence will hopefully make life here in the bunker unbearably tense for him. If you can 'adapt' any of your more violent stories to this day and age, that would be perfect. You might not consider yourself a violent person, but you did spend most of your life around them, and fight in what sounds like a minor war for a few years. I'm sure you have some very unsettling stories, at least for someone like Morian."
Hiccup frowned. "That might not be a good idea. I couldn't get too elaborate or specific, because of just how much I would have to change. Besides, he doesn't know my past. People fear the unknown. I might just drop a few hints, now and then."
Iris nodded. That was a fair point, especially considering Morian was capable of fact checking any specific lies Hiccup might have to come up with that involved this day and age. She wished she could completely cut Morian off from the outside world, but that wasn't an option. However, she could see exactly what he did, given she had administrative access to all computers in the bunker, and Morian would have to use one to communicate with anything outside of the bunker.
Abdul spoke next, as he rose from his table. "We do need to get rid of him quickly. We can't really start anything until Toothless is fully recovered, but if Morian is still here at that point, we're stuck. We won't be able to proceed until he leaves. And we don't want to waste time."
Hiccup agreed with that. "So, I need to get Morian out of here while Toothless recovers. That'll be a few weeks, so I do have some time." He smiled. "Maybe Morian will be driven out by the smell of Toothless's fish next door." Actually... "By the way, Iris, what do we do about that once the nukes start falling? We can't exactly grow fish in here."
Iris smirked. She had already considered that. "Toothless will have to learn to eat what the rest of us will for protein." She walked over to the kitchen and held up a cylindrical grey-green bar of nondescript matter. "It looks disgusting, but it tastes fine, and we make it entirely out of plants grown here, along with a few choice chemicals. A few modifications to the ingredients should match what Toothless gets from fish, and we can make way more of this stuff than he could ever eat. The specific plants we use grow extremely fast, and we have quite a few fields of them."
Hiccup laughed. "Don't tell him about this. I'd rather not deal with that sad day any sooner than I have to." He left the cafeteria a few minutes later. The next few weeks were going to be tough. He would have to balance pressuring Morian, something he really didn't enjoy even if it was necessary, and spending time with Toothless as he recovered. He hoped everyone else could help him with that. A bored Night Fury is not good for the health or sanity of anyone around him. Especially one confined to a single wing of the bunker, in order to keep him away from Morian. Still, he thought it was possible to do both.
