"Well, I've seen these big fellas before, ha-ha..." Astrid muttered this as Hiccup led her out back towards the big cat enclosure. The big tiger was sitting at the end of the fence of his area and stood up on all fours when he saw the unfamiliar figure behind his usual handler, which prompted Astrid to let out an awkward little wave at him. "That's uh... that's Hookfang, right?"

"Yep, that's him... the one and only..." Hiccup seemed very proud of the tiger as he went to the fence and poked his hand through it to stroke his head, the two of them exchanging chuffing noises as if they were having an entire little conversation. Astrid couldn't help but grin at this, before her attention turned to the black shadow sitting in the area next door.

"Hmm... and this, must be the famous Toothless…"

The leopard didn't seem to be accommodating her in any shape or form, and hadn't even gotten up from where he was sitting at the corner of the fence with his head drooped peaceful. As his handler and his ladyfriend approached him, Toothless opened my mouth a bit, allowing Astrid to see the pink of his gums. Astrid chuckled at this as she got onto her knees and shuffled to the very edge of the fence so that it was the only thing separating her from the leopard.

She glanced back at Hiccup with a grin as she slowly reached a hand forward to pet the big cat's face. "Uh, Astrid... I wouldn't do that if I were..."

HISS!

"Argh! Holy shit!" Astrid yanked her hand back and fell on her backside as the leopard suddenly unsheathed his claws and revealed his teeth in a fierce snarl, letting her see that they'd all grown out quite a bit since the video she'd seen and were still very, very sharp even without the big fangs to back up. The fence would have stopped him from attacking her anyway, but she still shuffled backwards in her burst of fright.

"Fuck me, that's scary!" She was still bursting out curse words through her heavily panting as Hiccup knelt down and gently pushed her behind him a bit, shuffling towards the edge of the fence and reaching forwards to try and pacify the leopard himself. "Easy bud, easy... she's a friend."

Astrid had one hand on his shoulder and was poking her head nervously from behind his back, Hiccup chuckling anxiously as he said "it's okay, you... you just scared him."

"I scared him?!" Astrid shot back in a tone mixing both anger and panic. Hiccup almost seemed to scoff at this as he reached his hand through the gap in the fence and gently placed it on the cat's nose, with the beast grumbling softly in response. Astrid's frantic, panicking tone slowed inyo awe and then warmed into a proud little grin as she saw this, admiring the sheer trust that was bonding the boy and his friend together.

She'd seen hints of this in his first-person vlogs, but this was her witnessing it herself for the first time, the animal lover in his real element.

"Aw... he's actually really cute... the um... the leopard, that is..."

"Yeah, ha-ha... alright... come on..." Astrid tensed back a bit as Hiccup extended a hand to her, and when he turned to face her he seemed almost surprised by how scared she still was. "Ast, it... it's okay... he won't hurt you..."

It took her a moment to think about this, staring at the hand he held out before she slowly and carefully took it. She always remembered how soft and gentle Hiccup had been with his hands when they were younger, but she was still surprised by the fact that they hadn't changed a bit even now. He took his hand off of hers and let her fully open it, before put his hand behind hers and pushing it slowly towards the fence again as the leopard looked up curiously.

"Just keep it open, that's it..." Hiccup eventually managed to get Astrid's hand through the fence, but still had his own nearby in case he had to yank it back away again. "Nothing to be afraid of... just let him come to you."

She tensed her eyes shut as she kept reaching forwards, tending a little as she felt her hand press firmly on the soft, furry nose. Once she opened her eyes to see the leopard putting his trust in her with complete relaxation, she exhaled heavily as her confidence came rushing back to her.

Astrid was grinning smugly as she patted the nose gently, clearly proud with herself as she looked at a still slightly worried Hiccup. "Alright, now just... pet him a little, you know... like a housecat... just be careful, though..."

"Yeah... you know, I think I'm getting the hang of this…" she whispered excitedly, before slowly taking her hand away as the leopard got back down to rest again. She glanced at Hookfang as he also sat down to sleep, before looking back to Hiccup with a grin as she said "so, what do these guys do then?"

Hiccup went a little wide-eyed at this question. "Wait, what... what do you mean?"

"Well, you know... do they like, do barrel rolls or something? Jump hoops? Eat treats? Come on, Hiccup, you see stuff like that on TV all the time..."

Hiccup looked away from her for a moment, taking about five seconds of silence before letting out an audible sigh. "They probably can, but they don't."

"Hmm..." Astrid pursed her lips a lit, her tone of voice almost sounding disappointed. "Well, these guys obviously trust you a lot, Hiccup... you ever thought about teachin' em a few tricks? I mean, I bet it'd get you a lot of views..."

"Astrid, I... I think there's something you should see..."

CCTV, Police Archive - Bludvist Family Circus

The one-armed, dreadlocked, heavyset ringmaster stood in the centre of the arena with one of it's spotlights shining on him and the other shining on the cage that was being opened. He and the loudly cheering audience were clearly speaking in a foreign language, most likely one from Eastern Europe, and the subtitles had to translate what they said.

"And now, ladies and gentlemen.. from the jungles of darkest India... the fiercest creature to ever walk the earth, tamed and trained for your viewing pleasure... Shere Khan, the striped dancer!"

The chain around his neck was made of an incredibly heavy metal and clearly weighed the young, frail tiger down as he slowly limped into the arena, clearly trying to keep his distance from the ringmaster. "Come! Move! MOVE!"

The beast cried out in agony as the ringmaster swung the pipe he was holding, tensing away with a high-pitched yelp as it slashed the right side of his back and a few drops of blood spurted out of the wound.

The man laughed as he kicked the beast so hard that it fell onto it's side, crying out again as the sand on the floor made its way into the fresh wound.

"We humans are the king of the beasts, my friends... they belong to us, they bow to us... and we can control them all!"

Astrid could barely comprehend what she was watching, and even though Hiccup was being completely silent she knew just from how he was clenching his fist around the small, green stress-ball in his hand that he was mad just at the sight of the disgusting video. "Oh gods... Hiccup, this... this is awful..."

"I know, I just..." Hiccup picked up the remote and exited the video, switching off the screen before lurching forwards in the chair to think for a moment.

"It was about two years ago now... me and Cami had only been working here a couple weeks... police just busted this circus, and they brought Hookfang here to us... I had Mom come over and she helped fix him up, disinfect him, stuff like that... he wasn't even aggressive, he just... he... he was just so.. so scared and, and he wouldn't eat for days, and... and when he... ugh..." Hiccup had to wipe his face to stop himself from crying just thinking about it. "When he first got into the enclosure, he looked like he'd never felt grass before, Astrid... fucking grass!"

"Man... but what about... you know..."

"Toothless?"

"Yeah. Was he from a circus too?"

"Botched animal trafficking... they were selling stolen cubs to be pets on the black market, like those whole illegal puppy farm things... yeah, and uh... well, Toothless was sold to some drug kingpin or something like that, whatever... when he was only about a month old. They took out his fangs, declawed his back feet, the crazy fucker even chopped the tip of his tail off, and... ugh..."

"How old was Toothless when you found him?"

"Nearly a year... he was snarling and hissing and he didn't trust anyone for a good couple weeks, but... one day, I went to feed him, and... I looked him in the eye, Astrid... he was just as frightened as I was..." Hiccup almost seemed to laugh at this, not a proper hysterical laugh, but a small, nostalgic one. "I looked at him... and I saw myself..."

"Hmm... yeah, I bet you did..."

"Well, whatever... the bastards are in prison now, and the boys are here with us... so that's something, I guess..."

Astrid sighed as she glanced out the window to see Hookfang sleeping, only just noticing that he still had a sizeable scar that ran down the right side of his back. "I just don't get it, Hiccup..."

"Eh... people can be cruel..."

"Well, I know, but how could... how could anyone treat such beautiful, innocent animals like that...? Really? Put them on display like fucking performers... geez, these poor guys don't need to get the crap kicked out of them for some sick asshole's entertainment, it... it's barbaric..."

"At least when humans do that, they usually get a choice, right?"

Astrid went a little more wide-eyed as Hiccup said this, since his tone of voice seemed surpisingly bitter with that last part. That wasn't meant to be a jab at her. It couldn't possibly be. Could it?

Nevertheless, she cleared her throat and wiped her face with her hand, flattening down the creases on her shirt as she stood up. "Well, I should... I should probably get going..."

"On, right... sure, yeah..." Hiccup pulled himself onto his foot and prosthetic, reaching a hand forwards for her to shake. "This was, uh... this was fun... kind of like old times..."

"Hmm... yeah, it was..." Astrid smiled at him as she put both her hands over his and pulled him towards her into a hug. He seemed notably less hesitant to return this one, and he even seemed to wait a little longer before separating from her again.

"So... you still got my number?"

"Oh, yeah... sure, I got it..." Hiccup patted the beast pocket in his shirt right where his heart would be. "And you've obviously got mine now, cause... cause I called you."

"Yeah... well, we'll get together some other time, right? Ha ha... maybe actually eat something next time we have a lunch date..."

They both chortled mischievously at this, almost sounding like children laughing at one of their old in-jokes again. Hiccup was the first to calm down, holding out his elbow and saying "well, Milady... shall I escort you to your bus stop?"

"Hmm... why thank you, kind sir..."