The next few days flew by in what seemed like an instant. I helped dad get ready for the festival, which is in one more day. Astrid and I have been teaching more classes at the dragon academy, although we are focusing more on self-defense tactics and survival skills for if the Whispering Death decides to resurface again, (see what I did there? Resurface? Because the dragon comes up from- out of.. the.. ground. Look, I'm usually quick with a joke. Get off my back!). As far as I know, no one else knew about me going to the festival with Astrid, and until then, I plan on keeping it that way. If the other Vikings knew about it, we would never hear the end of Snotlout complaining and whining and claiming he's the better-looking Viking over me. I'm not going to deal with that right now.
Finally, class ended for today and Snotlout, Fishlegs and the twins got on their dragons and flew home, leaving me alone with Astrid. She walked up to me slowly. "So," I started, "ready for tomorrow night?" She let out a little laugh. "You know it. I'm looking forward to seeing you there." "Me too… I mean I'm excited to see you there! Not that I'm looking forward to seeing myself there. That'd be weird. I see myself every day and I just-" She shut me up by pressing her lips against mine. "I knew what you meant," she said once she pulled her face away from me. She turned around and was walking to Stormfly. "Hey Astrid?" "What's up Hiccup?" I think I was beginning to blush a little because I could feel my face getting warmer. "If you're not doing anything right now, would you, uh, wanna go for a fly?" She smiled, jumped onto her dragon, and nodded.
My face beamed. I hopped onto Toothless and prepared for a great flight. Stormfly and Toothless walked side by side to the door, then stopped. I looked over to Astrid. "Ready?" She nodded again. "On three. One…" "THREE!" Astrid and Stormfly bolted out the door and flew into the sky. Me and Toothless froze for a second. Then he began to run and we took off after the two of them. We caught up with them and I flew so I was level with her on her right side. "I said on three!" I yelled over. "Oh, I heard you, Stormfly was the one who took off," she teased. We both smiled and flew as fast as our dragons could take us. With no destination in mind, we just flew.
Again, flying is the most incredible thing anyone could experience. Making the environment around you become so small and insignificant compared to you soaring through the sky is just a great feeling. But while flying alone can be relaxing, it was always fun to share the moment with someone, especially Astrid. The day she first met Toothless, we 'kidnapped' her and took her on an amazing flight across the sky and over the village. Ever since then, she became as obsessed with flying as I had. Watching her face radiate with joy and happiness as she and her dragon galloped through this never-ending sky makes me feel as though I HAD made a difference in this village. I seem to have made a difference in her life, and I'm thankful for that.
The two (well, four including our dragons) of us flew around the village for about forty minutes until I offered that we show each other some tricks that we've been working on. She accepted and showed her trick first: Stormfly flew ahead, faster than I thought she could go, and proceeded to do multiple gut-wrenching twirls. The dragon began to fly normal again and the two of them flew back to where Toothless and I were hovering. I could tell she was still dizzy because her head seemed to be bobbing up and down. "Beat that!" I patted Toothless' head. "C'mon bud, lets show em!" Toothless took off faster than a bullet. I tightened my grip on the saddle as he then rose higher and higher. "Ok bud, just like we practiced." He hit full speed and rotated his body 180 degrees so I was now hanging upside down. My fake leg unhooked from the foot holder and I fell.
Freefalling was possibly the second best experience I could have asked for. The wind pushing against my face and ruffling up my hair. The first time I went into a freefall like this was when I took Toothless out on our first real flight. Of course we nearly killed ourselves in doing so, but it was exhilarating nonetheless. I heard a whooshing noise coming up and felt as Toothless flew straight under me, catching me in mid air. I quickly landed on the saddle, clipped my leg in the tail mechanism, and let out a whoop of triumph. We flew back to Astrid and Stormfly. Man did she look impressed. "Ok, that was pretty amazing!" I patted Toothless' head again and he purred. "Great job bud." After another forty minutes or so of showing each other some impressive tricks, we decided to call it a day.
We flew back to the village and hopped off our dragons. Astrid walked up and hugged me tightly. "See you tomorrow, Teach." Again with the Teach! "You too." We released each other and began walking back to our houses. Toothless and I walked up to the front door, where my dad was waiting. "Ah, good, you're home," he greeted. "I need you to do me a favor, Hiccup." Oh great. "Dad, I just got back. Can't it wait?" "No, it can't. The hall has run out of fish to fry for tomorrow and I'm very busy right now making arrangements. I need you and Toothless to catch some more." Alright, this doesn't sound to hard. I let out a sigh and accepted the task. "Thank you. I've got to go talk to Gobber. Be sure to be back with plenty of fish!" I walked back over to Toothless as my dad walked down to Gobber's shop. "Sorry bud. We've gotta go get some more fish. Lets go over to the pond in the cove. That's got some good fish in there. What do you say?" The dragon snorted. "I'll take that as a yes." I hopped on and we took to the skies once more.
We flew over to the cove in a heartbeat. But when we got there, I couldn't believe what I saw: The Whispering Death! Its tail is still stuck under the rock from the last time we encountered it. Luckily for us, it was sleeping. Toothless landed quietly on the ground and I got off. My journal! I got out my journal and proceeded to draw this thing so we have a more accurate drawing of this creature. I finally finished and it began to move. "Oh Gods." I dropped the journal. Its eyes burst open and looked me up and down. It recognized me and let out a growl, Toothless returned it. "Toothless, it's ok. Let me handle this." Toothless backed off and sat down, observing me. I held up my hands to show this thing that I'm not a threat. It growled at me, showing its teeth. "It's ok, it's ok," I told it. I circled around until the large rock was right next to me. How couldn't it have gotten out? Couldn't it just eat the rock? Maybe it was cautious because it didn't want to keep eating through and possibly bite off its own tail. I, after all, know how it feels to lose a part of your body.
I put my body against the rock and let out a mighty heave. I pushed and pushed as hard as I could, but the darn thing won't budge! I put my shoulder into it and dug my feet in the ground, but still nothing. I was shocked to see Toothless come up behind me, nudging me. He wanted to help! But why? He'd be freeing his old enemy. Maybe he saw that I didn't think this thing was a threat anymore and decided to give me a hand. Or, paw. He ran forward into the rock and immediately, the rock fell backwards, off the beasts tail. The Whispering Death flew into the air, swirling and twirling all around, ecstatic to be free. I smiled at Toothless, proud of him that he was able to overcome his old rivalry to help me. The dragon froze in mid air and looked down at us. I'm not sure, but I think the thing just nodded at me, as if to say Thank You. After that, it flew straight down into the dirt and burrowed into the underground world, where it belonged. I looked to Toothless, "Good job bud. Come on, let's get those fish."