I am so sorry for disappearing on you all! I promise I didn't mean to, and I apologize so much! I made myself write multiple chapters so that won't happen again anytime soon.
It's really hard to write Valka. I don't know her character very well, since she's only been in the second movie, and I also have to think about how she would change from living with just dragons to living with dragons and vikings. So if I wrote her out of character, I apologize.
This story will include two OC dragons: one of my own, and silverwolvesarecool's OC dragon. Every dragon will get put in the story when the plot comes to it (if you put in a suggestion) or in the next chapter. If no plot suggestion, I will put them in the order they were posted. Earliest goes first and goes down the line.
Hiccup's POV
At some point during the night I had dozed off, despite my nightmare, and had no other dreams. I woke to a warmth- or rather, a lack of it. I opened my eyes and saw Toothless standing by the entrance and gesturing to where the others were walking out into the tunnel.
Standing up and stretching, I followed them up the tunnel and through more passageways that I failed to keep track of. It was like a labyrinth. After a minute of walking we came to a dead-end, blocked by a boulder. Cloudsplitter shoved it to the side and we walked through, looking around. I stared wide-eyed at the scene.
The cavern was about the same size as the Bewilderbeast oasis that Mom lived in. Plants of every shape, size and color were growing, huge, out of the sandy soil. Small streams ran through craters in the ground, filtering through the plants. Above us the rock dome closed in, but the very top was just a layer of water floating! How was that possible, to have the water there without it crashing down on top of us?
I whispered to Maplefang my thoughts and she in turn grumbled to Cloudsplitter, turning back to me again in a matter of seconds.
Glass, they call it. She scratched in the dirt. He says that they cook sand and sandstone to a certain heat and it turns see-through. It is as fragile as ice but extremely clear.
A memory popped into my head, something Fishlegs had told me that happened to him when we were teens. The day when Meatlug had eaten some random rocks in the search for Gronkle Iron, and it messed up so that everything metal became attracted to her hide. Fishlegs said that when she ate sandstone and shot lava, after it was cooled it turned into a clear substance that shattered when Gobber threw it behind him, thinking it was useless. I stored it away for future reference.
I squinted at the top and saw light filtering down. So we were under the ocean, hidden beneath the waves. Makes sense, I guess. The group kept walking until we reached the middle of the stone sphere, where a giant tree rose up with branches and leaves dipping towards the ground. They were huge; one leaf was the diameter of Toothless's head.
The Monstrous Nightmare, as I learned to be named Firefang, rose up on his hind legs and grabbed one of the smaller leaves at the top. He briefly said something to the dragons, before handing it to Toothless, who handed it to me. I put it in a saddle pack. We walked in silence to the entrance where we first came in. It was blocked again.
I turned to Firefang. "Thank you for letting us stay, and for giving us the cure for Astrid. If you need any more help, find a way to send a message to Berk and we will come." I bowed my head (I learned that it was a sign of greeting or farewell here), as well as Valka and the dragons, and the Oasis Dragons bowed their heads in return. Cloudsplitter opened the entrance, and we walked out and headed off without another word.
As the cave was blocked behind us, I stood for a moment and thought. It was so simple. We had the cure, no hard work, no fighting, just fly for a few days, catch some fish, and fly back. It was... strange, in a way.
"That seemed too easy," I said as we mounted the dragons.
"I though it would be more of a... I don't know, challenge. Like some wild dragon would be guarding it. It seems suspicious don't you think?" Mom said. I nodded.
"Well, we have what we came for. Now we head home as fast as possible before Astrid gets worse. We have four days."
TIMELAPSETIMELAPSETIMELAPSE
Something was wrong. There was more water hitting my face and clothes than just sea spray. I opened my eyes and sat up, releasing the straps that held me to Toothless's saddle as I slept. The sky was dark and gray and rain was starting to fall. I looked around me for islands, but there was nothing in the horizon that meant safety and shelter. I looked at Mom. She was crouched down on Cloudjumper (AN: I realise that Valka doesn't have a saddle for Cloudjumper and she rides him while standing, but I will probably make mistakes in the future), looking into the horizon and hadn't noticed I had woken up.
"We need to find shelter! Do you know where we are?" I yelled. She looked over to me and shook her head.
I sighed and put my hands in my lap. The storm was getting worse and we had nowhere to shelter. How would we make it through this?
A set of movement different from the waves below us caught my eye. I squinted at it, before clicking Toothless's fin to dive down. "Dragons!"
Maplefang's POV
Hiccup dived down to something I couldn't see, yelling that it was dragons. Thinking he had gone mad, Valka and I followed him in case he just crashed into the water and needed someone to pull him out. But as I got closer I could make out shapes. I flew next to Hiccup who was trying to explain our situation to the dragons. He really needs to learn DragonSpeech, I thought. I lowered closer to the dragons.
The dragons weren't anything like the Tidal class dragons I had seen on Berk. They were a dark turquoise color, with long thin snouts, frills on the head, flippers on their back legs, and long wings that had streaks of sea green. There were three of them, and they seemed to be playing a game with each other.
"Um, excuse me," I said politely. They looked up at me with mischief in their eyes. They must have not been older than adolescents. "Do you know where the nearest island is? We can't seem to find any and we need shelter from the storm."
"Oh yeah! Sure, we'll help you," the one in the front, who seemed to be the leader, said. "Just follow us!" They sped off to the side, diving up and down and splashing all around us, making us even more soggy. Occasionally one would disappear for a few minutes then reappear right behind us. Eventually I could make out a shape in front of us that was slowly getting bigger. An island!
"Nice to know that I haven't found all the islands in this area," Hiccup joked. "That would make my life boring."
We landed on the shore and turned back to the dragons that were splashing in the water. What are those dragons? I wrote to Hiccup in the sand, only to have it washed away by the raindrops. Fortunately, he got the message.
"Tide Gliders," He said. "Ocean-residing dragons."
"They have an extremely playful and friendly nature," Valka piped in. "It seems like they never grow up."
"We don't have a lot on Berk; they like open ocean more," Hiccup finished. We watched the dragons swim for a little longer, and started to head inland when a loud blast of thunder brought us out of our thoughts.
The island for the most part was flat. There didn't seem to be any noticeable features about it as I flew up to get a better look for shelter. Most of the shore was either beach or grassy plains, with a small forest in the center and the north. A river cut through the east side of the island and stopped near the middle. The southwest beach had a lot of rocks piled there. I also noticed, as I looked harder, that some of the forest was cut down like a Timberjack had been through there.
The wind changed and I spiraled in the air before barely getting my balance again. Okay, I thought. Definitely not flying.
I landed next to Hiccup and told him what I saw. "Hm." He turned to Valka. "What do you think?"
"Let's head to where the stream ends and avoid the leveled area. We don't want to intude on any sleeping Timberjacks." She said.
We headed inland as the wind started up again, blowing cold rain in our faces. The last of the light glowing behind the clouds faded, and the raindrops changed to sleet, then snow. Hiccup started coughing and Valka started sneezing and sniffling. This island was bigger on the ground than it looked in the air. We weren't near the forest, and it looked like Hiccup and Valka couldn't go on much longer.
I stopped in my tracks. The others looked at me in confusion as I started digging a campfire pit.
"What are you doing?" I looked up to see Alpha Toothless peering at me.
"Digging a hole for the campfire," I said as I finished scraping at the frozen dirt and looked for rocks to line the pit. "Hiccup and Valka can't keep going on in this weather, and that forest isn't getting any closer."
To my surprise, he nodded and walked back to Hiccup, herding him back to the pit as I lined it with stones and filled it with driftwood. Cloudjumper, getting at what we were doing, nudged Valka to the pit and lit it. We huddled around the fire, Hiccup in Alpha Toothless's arms, Valka in Cloudjumper's, and me standing on my hind legs with my back to the snow and my wings spread out to block the worst of the wind. My brand was visible to the others, but none of them paid attention, to my relief. The last thing I wanted to do was talk about my old home.
"You know, this reminds me of a time a few years ago, with the other teens and the dragons and the farm animals," Hiccup said suddenly.
"I never heard this story," Valka said sleepily. "Why don't you tell me?"
"Sure." Hiccup closed his eyes for a few seconds, and when he opened them it looked like he had traveled to a faraway place.
"It all started soon after we had made peace with the dragons. The animals were terrified of them. Yaks stopped giving milk; chickens stopped laying eggs. Me and the others tried to show the animals that dragons weren't that scary. None of it worked. The next day Bucket's bucket started getting really tight, which meant a bad storm was coming, even though Devastating Winter was still months away..."
The world was bright when I woke up- too bright. I opened my eyes to a field of white snow. The sun was reflecting off the powder piles, making me uncomfortable. I blinked a few times and was glad when my eyes adjusted.
I shifted my wings on my stomach and stretched my legs. Even though most dragons, including myself, could sleep standing, it was very uncomfortable. I had dozed off a few times before the storm died down enough for me to drop onto four paws and relax my wings.
I shook the snow off my back and nudged Alpha Toothless, who grumbled and in turn opened his wings and nudged Hiccup. Cloudjumper opened his eyes and woke Valka without a word. The dragon said few words, preferring to watch and say what he needs to in simple gestures.
"Okay," Valka said. "Let's head out now. We can eat in the saddle." We all nodded and Hiccup saddled up Alpha Toothless. Once he was ready we took off into the air.
A roar cut through the air and I turned around to see Hiccup and Alpha Toothless falling towards the ground. They landed in the snow and popped up with no injuries, but they still gave us a fright. I landed next to Hiccup, Valka right behind me. "Hiccup! What happened?" She cried.
Hiccup muttered something under his breath as he messed with Alpha Toothless's tail fin. "Toothless's tail fin locked up. The cold froze the bars together. Making a fire is risky, because the flames could set the fabric on fire, and then we would be stuck here. I guess... all we can do is make a sling and have Cloudjumper and Maplefang carry Toothless. With their agreement, of course," He said.
After searching through the saddlebags to find thick blankets and some rope, tying the corners safely. We had Alpha Toothless lay down on the blanket and secured him with the ropes. The only problem was that we didn't have quite enough rope, and we had to stretch it to tie it over Alpha. Soon, everything was secured.
"Ready?" Hiccup counted, seated on Cloudjumper to reduce weight. "One...two...three!"
I jumped up and pumped my wings as hard as I could, rising slowly into the air. I looked to my right and saw Cloudjumper using two wings, probably so as not to go ahead of me and tip the sling.
We were safely in the air when we started to fly forwards. We glided over the island and had made it to right over the forest before I felt the ropes weakening. "Hiccup!" I cried.
The ropes in my claws snapped. The sling fell down on my side and Alpha Toothless slid off. I let go of the short strands that was all in my claws and flew down. The Night Fury spread out his wings and glided safely in a clearing in the trees after spinning to balance himself out.
"Okay, we may need to get some vines. Maybe we can also see if any Tide Gliders can help us carry Toothless," Hiccup said. "Let's go. I'll search over here with Toothless. Mom, you and Cloudjumper search over there," He said, pointing first to his left then behind him. "Maplefang, you can search with me and Toothless."
We headed into our different directions, searching the trees for the least frozen vines we could. Occasionally we would here voices of "Found some!" and would group together to look at the amount we got, and if we didn't find much we headed to a different area. Eventually we made it to the cut out area of the forest.
"Wow, there is a lot here!" Hiccup said, bending down to grab vines off of a toppled tree.
"Be careful," Valka said. "I'll be over here, but keep a look out for Timberjacks."
We spread out once again, Hiccup on my left and Alpha Toothless on my right. Suddenly the wind changed, and I looked up at Alpha Toothless.
"Does that smell like what I think it is?" I asked.
"Yup."
Slowly, we walked over the fallen trees toward Hiccup. If we made a sound, we would be doomed. Almost, so close, and...
Hiccup stepped on a twig, unaware of the danger. The loud sound echoed in the quiet still air, and I held my breath. Hopefully, maybe, they didn't hear it...
A rumbling filled the air. The ground started trembling, and I looked to my right in horror as a ton of Skullwreckers charged out into the clearing, toppling trees and crashing through boulders. They had a wild and panicked look in their eyes. They were heading straight for us.
"Hiccup!" Alpha Toothless cried. I looked behind me. He was right on the edge of the herd. There was no way that he could reach Hiccup in time. I ran quickly towards Hiccup, using my speed that all Scorchspines had.
"Wait, wha- WOOOOOOAAAAAAAHH!" Hiccup yelled as I jumped up, grabbed his shoulders, and took off into the air, just getting out of the way as the Skullwrecker herd passed underneath us. I hovered in the air as they crashed into the other side of the clearing, crashing a new path through the trees.
I lowered down and let Hiccup out of my paws. "Thank you, Maplefang."
Without another word, too shocked to say anything, and created the sling once more. With the attached vines, we could safely secure Alpha Toothless in it.
"Okay," Hiccup said. "Mom, let me get on Cloudjumper, and then we can take off."
"Alpha?"I asked as Hiccup climbed on the Stormcutter.
"Don't call me Alpha anymore," He said suddenly. I looked over at him, surprised. "After you poisoned Astrid, I didn't know if I could trust you. But after seeing you rush into a herd of Skullwreckers to save Hiccup, I think it is safe to say that I can. So don't call me Alpha anymore. I hate the name."
I nodded, too shocked to say anything. We lifted off, calling to the Tide Gliders to help us. The leader from yesterday, who told us his name was Riptide, let us set Toothless down on his back to take some of the weight off the rope.
With everything safely set, we continued the long journey back to Berk.
Wow! That too A LOT of time to write. I'm taking this out of my school time instead of getting ready. Anyways, I hope you can forgive me. It looks like Toothless was able to forgive Maplefang. I see a friendship forming between these two...
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Have a wonderful day everyone!