This is edited version for better language. Updated 22.10.2017. Unfortunately my original comments on reviews did not copy here.

Original version was beta-/proofread by toothlessgolfer.

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Hiccup kept developing the prosthesis as days progressed. After initial crashes and "talking" with Toothless, he concluded that a simple rope wouldn't be enough. He simply couldn't use it to adjust the tailfin in all of the necessary positions that flying required. He used every chance to use the forge alone. Luckily with Stoick away, Gobber had to take care of some of his responsibilities. This usually left Hiccup with a couple of hours to use the forge in the afternoons. Otherwise, he would have had to do the work during the nights. He preferred sleeping in the cove with his only friend.

Hiccup's life outside the cove only consisted of watching dragon training, avoiding other teens, and working in the forge just long enough to keep Gobber satisfied. The moment he couldn't keep working with the prosthesis, Hiccup ran back to the cove. It was his safe haven. Everything else, his normal life, had become a necessary evil that he tried to get done as fast as possible. It only showed how little he had to live for in the village. Every morning Hiccup wished he could just stay with the one living thing who had accepted him for who he was. Then he jogged through the forest just in time to follow the others training to kill dragons like Toothless.

After spending every day with the most feared dragon in the world, Hiccup started feeling amused when seeing other teens' fear and struggles against the dragons in the ring. There had been some progress among the trainees. Astrid was especially developing into a real dragon killer. She had always been a fierce and gave her fullest to learn the best ways of killing. Snotlout didn't have enough brains to think and fight at the same time, but he had decent skills and brute force. The Twins spent as much time fighting each other as they spent fighting dragons. Then there was Fishlegs.

The largest teen might have known more facts about dragons than most adults, but it didn't make him a good dragon killer. All those facts just told him how dangerous the dragons could be and Fishlegs wasn't the bravest among the Vikings. Hiccup knew this already, and could easily see it from his vantage point during training. Fishlegs would tremble behind his shield and wince whenever the dragons as much as looked at him. This, combined with Hiccup's constant absence, had led to more problems for the large boy.

"Fishlegs, you're such a screw up."

"Get out of my way."

"Who cares, if you can't use it to kill something."

Viking youth had the need to reinforce their position by stepping over others and, with the village's official talking fishbone constantly nowhere to be found, they had turned to the next easiest prey. Fishlegs had never done anything to help Hiccup when he struggled to get through the day without getting beaten, but, knowing what that was like, Hiccup couldn't help but start feeling pity.

He stayed back at the ring one day after training was over until Fishlegs followed the others out of the ring. The training had gone much like the others. Gobber had chosen the Nadder as the opponent for the day, much to Fishlegs' disappointment. The Gronckle was bad enough, but the Nadder was bigger, faster, and had hotter flame. Fishlegs hadn't been able to make himself charge the dragon. None of the others had said anything to him but their looks told what they were thinking. The large boy walked out of the ring head down. He didn't even notice Hiccup joining him until he was walking right next to Fishlegs.

"How are you doing?"

"Oh… Hiccup, well um. Not well."

"Others are bullying you because you aren't doing well in training. Because you are different than them for not charging at dragon without second though."

"…"

"I know how it feels. I got lots of experience of these things."

"How do you manage with it?"

"Working in the forge, cracking sarcastic jokes at every setback, and wandering in the forest." Hiccup said with complete honesty. "It is lonely but better than getting beaten up and I have never been not lonely. In the end, I just try to survive until the night and invent something that would help me get recognized by the village."

"I'm sorry."

"For what?" Hiccup asked knowing exactly what.

"For being weak. I was too afraid to stand up. I didn't want to get bullied and abandoned you so I could belong to the group. Not that I ever really did."

Hiccup kept a close look on Fishlegs' face to see if he was sincerely sorry. He decided to give the other boy a chance.

"Thank you for saying that, but you can still avoid my fate if you start doing better in dragon training. That's their excuse to go after you, but they wouldn't bully a great warrior."

"I know but I can't help it. I know how to defeat the dragons, in theory, but every time I face one I freeze. I'm too afraid."

"It's not as dangerous as you think, you know."

"What do you mean?"

Hiccup stopped and turned to face Fishlegs directly. When he spoke, he spoke more quietly and seriously than before.

"I have been watching the dragons during training. It seems Gobber was wrong with what he said on the first day. The dragons aren't going for the kill. The Gronckle only hit your shields, but never attacked you after that. Nadders are supposed to be very accurate with their spikes, but this one never actually hit any of you. The Zippleback has gassed you, but hasn't lit the gas up in time to seriously burn anyone."

"Well, I can't say that your observations are wrong. Maybe they really haven't seriously tried to kill us. It could be because they have been imprisoned for so long, but that doesn't mean they wouldn't kill us next time."

"What if you had a way to make the dragon not want to even get near you."

"That would be perfect if there was something like that."

"There is."

"What do you mean?"

"I can show you, but you have to promise not to tell anyone. Others wouldn't believe it anyway or would think it's not 'the Viking way.' "

"Okay, I promise. What it is?"

"Eels."

Later in the early evening, Hiccup arrived at the cove. As usual Toothless was already awake and waiting for him right next to the narrow entrance Hiccup used. Hiccup had noticed that their ability to feel each other's presence and general mood had grown during the past days so Toothless had plenty of warning when his human was approaching. The dragon purred when he saw Hiccup arriving and without a scratch. He gave Hiccup room to put down what he carried and then sniffed the boy to be sure he really wasn't hurt. Hiccup used this chance to grab the large black head between his hands, one of which soon found its way to scratch behind Toothless' ears. Two green eyes closed as their owner enjoyed the simple touch.

'You know, you wobble your tail when I do this?' Hiccup stated, silently smiling at his friend as he kept scratching behind dragon's ears.

'I know. Ah that's the spot.'

'If all dragons are like you we could probably defeat the queen by scratching her army into submission.'

Toothless opened his eyes to look at Hiccup. Mention of the queen had gotten him into more serious mood.

'It wouldn't work. Dragons under her control think that her happiness is most important thing that matters. They wouldn't care how good this feels.'

'So the only way to stop the war is to somehow free them.' Hiccup reasoned.

'You freed me. Maybe you can do it with others.'

'But I still don't know how I did it, and she had already lost most of her control over you.'

'You can do it. You may not have the power to reach as far or wide as the queen does, but when you touch my mind it's completely different from her or any other. She can make us do and think things we wouldn't otherwise, but I was still myself after you freed me. When you first touched me, you went much deeper than she ever could and I can still feel part of your mind with mine. I think it's protecting me from her.'

Hiccup had unconsciously stopped scratching Toothless while thinking what the dragon had just told him.

'Do you really think I have such power? I mean we are talking about stopping wild dragons controlled by giant monster.'

'If you can easily take over my mind some lesser dragons won't have a chance.'

'?'

'You remember when we were talking about people who hurt you or… when we were in that grass…'

Toothless' thoughts got darker with that memory. Hiccup slapped his snout in response. It was more like a soft tap, Hiccup couldn't bring himself to hit harder, though he wasn't strong enough to hurt Toothless even if he tried. It was still enough to get the dragon's attention.

'Stop sulking over that. It was an accident. We didn't know what that grass could do and I was careless. You have to stop blaming yourself.' Hiccup's voice softened. 'You have already helped me heal more injuries than that.'

Toothless had turned his head downward while receiving Hiccup's reprimand. At second thought, he lifted it up so that two pairs of eyes could meet each other. Before Hiccup had met Toothless, he wouldn't have believed how much feeling and emotions you could see from a dragon's eyes. His fingers got back to work hoping to lighten the dragon's mood.

'Now, what were you saying about me taking over your mind?'

'Those two times your mind took over mine. I couldn't control my body because you wanted me not to move and I'm sure you could have controlled my thoughts too.'

'I'm sorry, I just…'

'Don't be.' Toothless pushed his head against Hiccup while purring, 'You did nothing wrong. I am happy you did what you did.'

'Aren't you worried that you could be controlled like that?'

'That is how I have lived my whole live.'

His blunt answer caught Hiccup by surprise, though it was true. He had seen memories from Toothless where he wasn't living under queen's influence.

'You are not her. I trust you and you don't need to twist my mind if you want me to do something for you. Still, you need to practice before I let you anywhere near one of her dragons.'

'How do I do that.'

'I help you. You can use me to practice, but can I eat first.'

'Yeah sure. Oh right I almost forgot. I was supposed to tell you something.'

'Does it have something to do with that new scent I found on you?' There was no cheating Night Fury's nose.

'That is probably Fishlegs.'

'Fish don't have legs. At least I have never seen such fish.'

Hiccup chuckled at the dragon's comment.

'It's just his name. Fishlegs is one of the other teens in the village, the only one who hasn't really bullied me although he had always been too afraid to help me either. Unfortunately, he is failing in dragon training.'

'That's good if you ask me.'

'Except it makes him target for those bullies, especially since I'm always here, safe with you. That's why I helped him, a bit.'

'How?'

'I told him to carry an eel with him.'

Toothless backed off and made a gaging gesture with his tongue hanging out of his mouth. Hiccup had to reach to touch the black scales again.

'I get you don't like the idea?'

'It's poisonous and disgusting, but might work because of that.'

'Good, that's what I was counting on. I hope this doesn't ruin your appetite.'

Hiccup had actually learned to enjoy the sight of Toothless devouring his meal. Maybe it was because of the happiness and contentment he could sense from his friend. While the dragon was eating, Hiccup was spreading out rest of the stuff he had brought. He needed to be able to both pull and push the fin to the right position. For that, Hiccup had developed a pedal system that was connected to the fin with iron rod and set of strings. With it, he could move the fin both ways and much more accurately than with a single rope. Toothless had made it clear that it wasn't enough to just open it or not. Now Hiccup was trying to figure how to attach the whole system on Toothless so it wouldn't fall off in flight, break, or cause much discomfort to the dragon. He spent a few hours fitting the system on Toothless and adjusting it. For rest of the evening, he dove in Toothless' draconic mind before going to sleep in the embrace of two black wings.

The teens scattered when The Deadly Nadder rushed out of the pen. The twins had started fighting each other and got literally thrown aside during the first minute. Hiccup kept a close eye on the dragon as it proceeded not to go for a kill but ignored the twins instead. Then it noticed Fishlegs at the edge of the ring. The Nadder rushed him seemingly intending to crush the boy against the wall. Then the dragon suddenly skidded to a halt in front of Fishlegs. The large boy was frozen from fear as the dragon sniffed him. Only Hiccup could even see him behind the Nadder so when the dragon suddenly recoiled, they thought that Fishlegs did something to it. The Nadder turned around and ran halfway through the ring leaving a shaking Fishlegs alone with just his hammer. The dragon only stopped when Astrid lunged at it. She hit the Nadder's head hard with the flat side of the axe making the dragon stumble back towards its pen. Hiccup flinched seeing the strike connect. He now knew the Nadder wasn't some mindless beast that you could beat how you wish.

The important part was what happened after the Nadder was locked away. Even from outside the ring Hiccup could see the surprised looks on the teens' eyes as Fishlegs joined the group. They weren't exactly cheering out loud, but Hiccup could hear some non-insulting comments while he was walking into the ring. Gobber's voice greeted him almost before Hiccup got through the gate.

"Alright, Hiccup. Any comments from your point of view."

"Not much new really... Twins were fighting as always, but Fishlegs and Astrid did well although Astrid could have been more careful. The Nadder could easily have shot its spikes at her if it wasn't distracted."

"True. Everyone remember that Nadders can shoot their spikes also in directions that they can't aim their fire to without turning. Today's training was short so I want everyone to spend afternoon training with their weapons."

Hiccup and Fishlegs stayed behind when the others left groaning because of the extra training. As soon as they were far enough not to see or hear the two, Hiccup turned to face Fishlegs.

"I get it you tried my trick."

"Yes," Fishlegs put his hand under his fur coat and pulled it out with a dead eel hanging from his fingers.

He wasn't happy about keeping the slimy thing under his clothes, but that wasn't the only thing boy's expression revealed. Hiccup had expected this and prepared as best he could.

"Hiccup, how did you know it would work?"

"I have done some research for a while now. All anyone cares about is how each dragon can kill you and how you can kill it, but have you ever thought about what they eat."

"Well, most dragons eat meat and fish, though different species can have their preferences."

"True, but not any fish. Go take a look at the storehouses after the next raid. I bet that no eels are missing, not that there are that many in the first place."

"I wonder why they don't like eels, but it's probably not only their taste. That Nadder looked like it was horrified," Fishlegs reverted to silent monologue analysing this new information.

Hiccup, of course, already knew the answer, but couldn't tell that much. It was already hard enough to justify the information he gave the other boy. Unfortunately, Fishlegs had a similarly curious mind as Hiccup's.

"Hiccup, have you found out anything else that others don't know?"

"Uh… well, maybe."