Don't own HTTYD (or anything closely related, either...)

Sorry this took so long. I had a lot to do in the past week, including school stuff and my computer not "granting access" to me onto the website...

Oh well. It's up now!

-Mitti

- - § - -

"Hush!"

Hiccup jumped at Blizzard's rough tone. The tunnel, despite being lit by the fascinatingly strange glowing orbs that were lodged within the walls a few centimeters, seemed to become dimmer as they walked this path. Blizzard had been absolutely positive this was the tunnel to take, stubbornly defending herself by repeating that the UnderIce dragon had always gone this way. Hiccup could not argue with her knowledge of the island, yet always wondered why she had never begun speaking too much about the dragon in general.

"What?" Hiccup asked, maintaining his voice to a whisper. Her eyes seemed to have bits of ice in them, and her shoulders were tensed.

"The dragon might be around here," she said in a quiet tone. "I've seen it sleeping here sometimes. It always hisses at me."

"Hisses at you?" the brown-haired boy echoed in disbelief.

"You don't know anything about this 'UnderIce' dragon," Blizzard snapped. "I know plenty. I've been around it for, what, seven years?"

Another secret played out of the blood redheads mouth.

Two deep blue eyes widened in surprise, and the girl's mouth let out a small squeak. Hiccup looked sharply at her, and wondered why she was so horrified at the idea of telling him that she'd been on Depth Island for seven years. "Is that bad?" Hiccup asked cautiously, while two eyes looking very similar to blue azaleas turned stiffly toward him.

"Uh, no, no," Blizzard said quickly, smiling a faux smile upon her pale lips. "But I can't be sure if it's been seven years. Sorry. It might'a been six, or maybe five." Pretending to be in deep thought, the poorly-dressed girl put a finger to her chin, narrowing her eyes at the tunnel ahead. Hiccup decided to let her be, and simply just keep walking.

Well, Toothless had other ideas.

He had been watching the two bicker (well, technically it was Hiccup asking a question and then Blizzard snapping at him) and had decided he wanted some attention. He thrusted his head forward, pupils dilated. Hiccup had patted his head as the two walked along, and soon began talking absentmindedly to Toothless.

"What do you think Astrid will say when we get back?" he asked his best friend, who throated with doubt that the blonde would let the brown-haired boy get away without a slap. Or two.

"Uh, she won't be happy, will she," Hiccup muttered. "But at least we're on the trail of an UnderIce dragon! Think about it, bud, a dragon that's related to you!"

Toothless smiled widely, showing no teeth. Blizzard watched the duo with curiosity.

"And what will Dad say? He'll be so mad." It was a time of thriving, since the last traces of winter were slowly fading into the mist of past, but with worry over the chief's son the people of Berk might not exactly be so successful. Would it be all Hiccup's fault? Did Astrid know where he was, and had told Stoick?

Had Astrid come to look for him?

That set a knot of fear in Hiccup's stomach. "Bud, what if Astrid's out looking for us?" the teen Viking asked, making Toothless tilt his head in wonder. "She'll have no clue we're underground. She might search for days, and maybe get lost. Or she could drag the others into this . . ."

Blizzard was now watching the scene amusedly, as if it were her favorite television show. The three kept walking.

Hiccup's feet hurt, yet he ignored them. His hunger, however, was harder to ignore. It made him feel very dizzy at times, and although the blood redhead had been very generous with her "supply" of food, it hadn't been what the boy was used to. His torso was also cramping up occasionally, making it hard to walk. Blizzard seemed to get much less food, and she looked fine.

Well . . . Was she fine?

The Viking was reminded of his so-far silent companion and turned to the girl, who had simply continued walking through the tunnels. However, when Hiccup caught a glimpse of a split up ahead, the girl slowed her walk.

"Which way do we go?" Hiccup asked.

A small bang of loose hair fell into Blizzard's face. She puffed her breath at it, but when it landed back in between her eyes she took the mirror shard (which was still in her hand) and cut it off with a rough fashion. A small lock of dark red hair floated down to the ground.

"The left," Blizzard said automatically afterwards, pointing to an even dimmer tunnel. "This is where it almost always is. See this?" a bony finger pointed to a small, white iridescent "thingy" on the ground. Hiccup bent down, and realized that it was a fraction of a scale. A very tough, waterproof scale. "It's one of the dragon's scales. I've seen them all over the place around here."

"How many times have you been over here?" Hiccup pocketed the scale piece in his rucksack on his back before following the briskly-walking girl. He had realized, with confusion and satisfaction, that his make-do wooden leg was starting to bother him less. He was walking much more evenly.

"A few." Blizzard shrugged nonchalantly. "Dunno. Never counted. But hey, we're close to the UnderIce dragon. I can promise you that, strange person."

Well, in Hiccup's mind, Blizzard was the strange one. Yet he hadn't been bothered to feel offended at her laid-back comment, even if it was at a random time. She never looked back at the mildly-lacking Hiccup and Toothless, as if her blue eyes were permanently glued to the lesser-lit space.

"Why is this place not as bright?" Hiccup asked, wondering if the girl had an answer. "Did you put those crystals in the walls?"

"No, of course not," Blizzard scoffed. "How could I actually lodge those darn things in the walls, anyway? I don't have a pickaxe. And I dunno why it's not as bright. Person that used to live here ran out of shiny thingies?" It was rather obvious, by her tone, that she did not graciously think of the stones. It was something she merely overlooked, as everyone overlooked something at sometime. She also seemed to have no clue what these gems were, or what they were made of.

After a few moments, of silence, Blizzard became more chatty. Hiccup wondered why she had those swings of wanting to talk. "Is it fun riding Toothless?" she asked him, curiosity lining her face as she looked intently at the duo. She had faltered back a few steps so she could talk face-to-faces.

"It's a lot of fun," the spearmint-green-eyed boy replied. "We normally fly all around our island every morning, if we have time."

"Wow," Blizzard breathed, and albeit she still had a guarded look to her eyes and body language, she seemed to consider the two as person and dragon she trusted. "Could he fly in here?" she queried suddenly, looking up at the ceiling, which was a few arm-lengths out of reach.

"Maybe. Do you wanna ride him?"

"I -" the blood redhead stopped for a moment, tilting her thin face to look at Toothless. He purred back encouragingly.

"Sure."

There was a moment where Hiccup was glad that Blizzard had seemed to warm up to dragons more, but as soon as the trio stopped and Hiccup swung his left leg over the back of Toothless, he realized something was wrong. And it would crush the whole idea.

His prothetic foot.

The design of his new left foot was so that he could still control Toothless's tail fin. However, with a chunky and clumsy piece of wood replacing that, there was no way for Hiccup to get his foot into the gears so he could control. Toothless noticed this also, and growled sadly.

"Hm?" Blizzard asked, and Hiccup assumed that his expression had faltered, with her seeing so. "Is everything okay?"

He looked apologetically into her big eyes. "I need my prothetic foot to help Toothless fly. And with this . . ." He got off of Toothless and shook his left "foot" helplessly.

"Oh," Blizzard said. "Well, then should we continue walking?" as she turned, with her face still mildly sad but having an attempt to cover it up, Toothless throated a noise, and gave the brown-haired boy an idea.

"Wait," he said. "What about if he runs? You wouldn't mind that for a little while, would you, bud?" Toothless shook his head "no" vigorously. Blizzard turned back, her grip on her mirror shard loosening in her left hand.

"Really?" she asked sincerely, watching as Hiccup climbed aboard Toothless again. "Is he alright with that?"

"Ask him," Hiccup said, while Toothless smiled his signature smile that had given him his name. Blizzard smiled a faint smile. Silently, gingerly, she climbed awkwardly over Toothless, but it was mostly hard for her because of her dress. Luckily for her, her tannish-colored dress stretched, allowing her to still put one leg on one side of Toothless, and vice versa for her other leg. "Okay," she said slowly. "Now what?"

Hiccup gave Toothless a small push with his hands, urging him forward. Toothless, excited and ready to run, burst off in a quick manner of happiness. Hiccup was glad that he felt some wind in his face, even if it was only a little, and Blizzard . . .

Had been surprised, to say the least.

She squeaked a very un-Blizzard-like noise, and before she could fall of wrapped her arms tightly around Hiccup's torso, squeezing out all the air for a moment. After a moment when her adrenaline and surprise had gone down, she slowly relaxed her grip and settled for one hand tightly grasping his vest, while the other hand scoured the ground. She seemed to marvel in the fact that she was going this fast.

"This is amazing!" she cried, looking at her hand. It had scrapes from stray rocks on it, and was a reddish color, with contrasted greatly with her pale skin, but Blizzard did not seem bothered. She poked Hiccup's shoulder. "D'you do this every day?" she asked in a slight awe. For once, Hiccup realized with surprise, her eyes had completely lost that guarded look, and were placed with a joy and softness, as if she was simply a little girl with her feelings easily hurt.

"Yeah," Hiccup said, while Toothless roared (thought a quiet roar) in the pleasure of running with his friend (or friends . . .?). "But normally we're in the sky."

"Imagine, being in the sky!" Blizzard said dreamily, pushing her hand against the ground once again. "Toothless, you're so fast! You must be the fastest drag -"

Afterwards, a shout, a squeak, and a throated noise followed.

In what had seemed to be a few mere seconds, the three were lying in a disorderly pile on the ground. Toothless, for reasons unknown to Hiccup, had suddenly skidded to a halt. He had yelled in surprise, while Blizzard had once again squeaked; something that was not like her, until this point in time. There was a small scattered pile of black scales, Hiccup saw with a pang. Those were Toothless's scales, which had been perfectly fine and intact until the recent crashing.

"Toothless?" the boy asked his dragon, who groaned woozily. When he seemed fine, Hiccup turned to the girl, who was lying in a broken way on the stone ground. "Blizzard?"

"I didn't know you had crash landings," the redhead said dizzily, sitting up from her sprawled-out position. "That hurt."

Hiccup nodded, sympathizing both. Blizzard had not been quite ready for that, and Toothless had stopped . . .

Why had he stopped.

"Bud, what did you see?" Hiccup asked as the Night Fury stood up. "Why'd you stop?"

Toothless looked at him with big puppy-dog eyes, as if he was apologizing. He jerked his head toward a crevice that looked man-made, chipped away from the original interior of these mysterious tunnels. It was a few feet behind them, yet that made sense, considering that Toothless had stopped right about there.

"What's that?" Blizzard asked, her eyes still having a spinning look to them.

"I dunno," Hiccup said, walking over to the crevice. It had a small cloth spread in an unorganized way over a few lumps. Curious, Hiccup pulled the faded fabric and drew it towards him, wondering what was underneath it. Toothless and Blizzard had appeared at his sides.

The first thing Hiccup noticed was a wrinkled pile of cloth, looking almost identical to Blizzard's dress that she wore. The blood redhead's eyes widened, and she gasped, making the other two look over at her.

"My pants!" she cried, grabbing them and smiling happily. "I found them!" Without a second thought, underneath her dress she slipped them on. They fit her form, although they were a bit big, and she, without a second warning, began cutting off the dress near her hipbones with her mirror shard. Hiccup watched her with confused narrowed eyes.

"What're you doing?" he asked.

"I'm making my outfit more manageable," she said as she cut around. "I lost my pants a while back, and sewed my shirt together with a skirt I had. I hated this dress. But now I found my pants!" she had finished, and was holding the skirt, still looking perfectly fine, in her right hand proudly. Her pants and shirt looked the same color, minus the shirt being more faded.

"Oh," Hiccup said, before turning back to the strange crevice. A shadow was formed over half of the wedge, since the light was still thinning, yet the green-eyed boy could still see what was left over. And he was happy.

"My leg!" he exclaimed, grabbing the prothetic foot Gobber had made him all that time ago. "How did it get here?"

Blizzard came back next to Hiccup, but quickly sprawled out on the ground in a relaxing manner. "I bet it was the UnderIce dragon. Ooh, that was what took my pants!" the girl was soon muttering annoyed phrases under her breath while Hiccup took off the sorry excuse for a foot (no offense to Blizzard) and lodged his old/new (or whatever) one back into place. It fit perfectly, and made him feel much more balanced and coordinated.

Then Toothless growled.

And it wasn't a friendly growl, either. Hiccup glanced up, while Blizzard lifted her head to the dragon. Her eyes sharpened into a defense mode once again as she saw, through the shadows, a dragon unlike any other. With four tail fins on a tail whipping furiously, the dragon, it's scales gleaming rainbows in the light, was obviously not welcoming the strangers.

Two silver eyes, strong enough to take breaths away, penetrated not Toothless, not Hiccup, but Blizzard.

Silver met blue.

And behind two of the eyes was a thin layer of questions.

Why are you here? Why won't you leave me alone? Blizzard thought to herself.

The dragon reacted as if it had heard her.

- - § - -

The UnderIce has silver eyes!

Blizzard has blue!

Hiccup has green!

So does Toothless!

Hope you like it!

-Mitti