His Soul Reflects My Own: Freedom, a DreamWorks' How to Train Your Dragon fanfic by Raberba girl
Chapter 4 (rough draft)
A/N: At the very last minute, I split the chapter in half. (So now, the old chapter 4 is now chapters 4 & 5, and the old chapter 5 is now chapter 6. ^^;)
o.o.o
Hiccup felt almost like he was facing down an angry, frightened dragon instead of a human, which was perhaps why he felt less inclined to panic than he would have expected.
He had zero chance of escaping this situation by force, so after the first second or two, he didn't even try. Hiccup was a tall man, but Squirt was even taller, and Hiccup's feet were dangling above the ground. Hiccup managed to hook his arms over Squirt's, trying to at least relieve the pressure of gravity on his throat. Then he could do nothing else other than make eye contact, so he did.
'You said you loved me. You promised you'd never hurt me.' Choking, tears starting to leak down his face, Hiccup tried to will his thoughts into Squirt's mind. 'You're hurting me. You're hurting me, you lied to me, you're betraying me.'
He thought he should have passed out by now. He finally noticed that even though it was still so hard to breathe, it wasn't...entirely impossible. Had Squirt's grip loosened, just a little...?
Hiccup's toes touched the ground. He waited, still fighting for breath. His feet were gradually able to carry more and more of his weight, and it got increasingly less difficult to breathe.
Finally he was just standing there, still resting his hands on Squirt's arms, slowly catching his breath, tears drying on his face. He could feel Squirt's loosened hands around his throat start to tremble.
His voice, when he finally had the strength to speak, was raspy but calm. "Let me go."
Something twitched in Squirt's expression. Hiccup closed his eyes in apprehension when he felt those strong hands tighten again, but then they relaxed a second later. They still remained draped threateningly around his neck.
Hiccup opened his eyes. "Can't...forever." It hurt to talk... "Have to let go. Or kill me." 'Please, please, please don't kill me...' "Choose."
They stood in silence for what seemed like a very long time. Squirt's expression was intense but otherwise unreadable. Hiccup waited.
Squirt suddenly gave a sobbing gasp and let go. As Hiccup staggered away and collapsed to his knees, coughing and retching, Squirt backed away a few steps and then sank into a crouch, arms wrapped around himself, lips pressed together, wide eyes fixed on his chieftain.
Hiccup realized that his back was turned to his assailant, and decided to deliberately keep it that way. He had no hope of physically overpowering the Dream Master, even if he could see him coming. Better to assert some small bit of control, to show that he was unafraid to leave himself vulnerable.
He took his time recovering, palms pressed against his collarbone, fingers very gently touching his abused throat. He cried a little, not bothering to hide it; his body was shaking, nausea simmering in his stomach. His mind seemed detached from it all, calm and a little disdainful, watching and waiting for his body to stop whining and get ahold of itself.
At last, Hiccup climbed to his feet. He turned back to Squirt and approached slowly. Squirt didn't move, shoulders hunched as he stared up at Hiccup with terrified eyes. Hiccup tried hard not to feel superior or vindictive, tried to remind himself that Squirt was physically capable of standing right back up again and grabbing him and strangling him to death. 'This is not an enemy. This is a seriously messed up kid, and you had better tread carefully, Stoickson,' Hiccup lectured himself.
At the same time, he was trying to stop 'Why?! Why?! Why?!' from looping endlessly through his thoughts. 'I didn't, I never, when did I ever try to control him or force him-?! ...Unless he was raging at Drago instead of me, but I happened to be the only one he could reach...'
He came to a stop before the humbled Dream Master. There was a long silence.
"...Squirt."
The young man seemed to shrink, his head bowing low as his knees touched the ground.
Hiccup drew in another breath to steady himself. "Yes. You can crush me. You're strong, I'm weak." He wanted to say more, but the pain forced him to speak sparingly. "But you're in Berk's flock now. Your strength is to protect. We're flockmates. We protect each other. We don't hurt each other." He thought that Squirt might have said something, but it was hard to tell. "Can't hear you," Hiccup said tonelessly. "Say it louder."
"Yes," Squirt managed.
"Yes, what?"
"Y-Yes, I...I did, the wrong thing, I...I sh-should never have harmed You-"
"Or Hookfang. Or Snotlout."
"They are Your flockmates," Squirt whispered miserably. "They are precious to You, I should not have harmed them."
"Your flockmates. Mine and yours, too."
"Yes...yes, flockmates are not to be harmed." After a moment, Squirt uncurled, resting his hands on the ground, straightening his back, lifting his chin. Tears filled his eyes. "What else must I learn, Chieftain?"
Hiccup blinked, confused.
Squirt lifted his hands, which were shaking a little, and spread his arms. "Th...That sequence was deleted, but I will still follow it if You wish. I-I don't know what You are waiting for, unless there is more for me to learn before You teach me."
"Teach you...? I don't know what you're..."
"...Even if You consider me to be Your flockmate, You are still...chieftain. You are not bound by the rules Your flock must follow."
"What-" The stance finally registered, the way Squirt was opening himself up to attack. Hiccup realized exactly which sequence Squirt had been referring to, the one that had so horrified Hiccup when he'd found on Squirt's chip months ago and deleted it. "Wh-?! No! GET UP!"
Squirt stared at him.
"Get up!" Hiccup buried his hands in his own hair, unable to even look at Squirt as the Dream Master climbed slowly to his feet. "No! Just- No! That is sick!"
"...What do I do...?"
He looked so broken and lost that Hiccup's heart ached at just the sight of him. He moved close and gently touched a hand to Squirt's face until Squirt met his eyes. "Squirt, I'm not going to hit you."
"..."
"...Please don't ever hurt me like that again, or our flock."
"Yes, Master," Squirt murmured back, closing his eyes as he leaned into his touch. "Forgive me...I meant, 'Chieftain'..."
Hiccup had been going to say more, but was caught off guard by the implications of Squirt's slip-up. It had not been the first time Squirt had accidentally called him that, either. "Squirt-"
There was a whistling shriek of Night Fury fire. Hiccup flung his arms around Squirt without even looking, turning himself into a shield; fire exploded against the ground nearby.
"MOVE, HICCUP!"
"Don't shoot him!" Hiccup shouted back. "Don't shoot!"
"GET AWAY FROM HIM!"
A hand seized the back of Hiccup's clothes and jerked him backward; Hiccup desperately shoved at Toothless's outstretched arm, managing to throw off his aim enough for the shot to miss. Squirt stood silent and still.
"Toothless, no! NO!"
Hiccup had learned that in an emergency, he could stop his dragon from shooting by forcing Toothless's hands close to Hiccup's own body, taking himself hostage. Toothless had learned that his human tended to pull off this move when Toothless was angriest and most justified in killing or hurting someone.
There was a very short struggle, which ended with Toothless gripping both of Hiccup's wrists in one hand and pinning him close to his side. The Night Fury's free hand raised toward the unmoving Squirt and began to glow; Hiccup, completely helpless, could do nothing but shout. "Don't hurt me!"
Toothless's hand faltered.
"Toothless, I'm begging you, please, he's still our flockmate, you can't-!"
"Spare him? Spare him?" Toothless raged. "Always always always...!"
"I'm fine, I'm okay, I just-"
Toothless set his palm against Hiccup's jaw and gently but firmly forced it up.
"Toothless-"
Toothless stared at the bruises. His pupils contracted.
"I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine...!"
Toothless was shaking with rage as he slowly turned his face toward the Dream Master. "You have done this to my consort that I treasure."
"Then strike me down," Squirt said quietly.
"No! No striking, Toothless put your hand down...!"
The hand remained extended, glowing. Trembling. Not firing.
Tears spilled down Toothless's cheeks. "Why does He do this to me...? He made me love Him but now He won't let me keep Him safe, it hurts-"
"Yet if He was more like us, we would not love Him as we do."
"Don't you dare say you love Him, your love is poison!"
Squirt bowed his head as Toothless's fading fire abruptly brightened again.
"Don't hurt me, please don't hurt me-" Hiccup said desperately.
"SHUT UP! HURTING HIM NOT YOU!"
"Please don't shoot anyone else I love," Hiccup begged.
It was a cruel weapon, and it hurt himself as well, but it was the only one he had. Toothless released him with a cry and staggered away, clutching at his own scarred wrist.
It took Hiccup a moment to recover. He meant to speak to Squirt, but found himself reaching for his other half instead. "Toothless, please..."
"Why do You do this to me?" Toothless sobbed. "Why? Very so many times, always always always, why?"
"I'm sorry, Toothless, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."
"I love You so much," Toothless whimpered, clutching him close. "It hurts."
Hiccup held him too, comforting him, then pulled back and murmured, "I am alpha of our humans. He is human, so he's mine. Do you trust me, bud...?"
Toothless exhaled and bowed his head, allowing his brother-alpha to take his rightful place in their shared domain. "When he hurts You, he hurts me," Toothless murmured, one final resistance.
Hiccup gave a quiet sigh. "If he kills me, you're allowed to kill him." He knew in his heart that Squirt would not harm him again, and if he was wrong, then...well, at that point it wouldn't really matter. "Only if I'm dead."
Toothless buried his face in Hiccup's shoulder and mumbled something that Hiccup couldn't technically hear, but understood anyway. He patted the dragon's back, gently pushed him away, and turned back to Squirt. Toothless watched with his hands clenched into fists, his wings raised rigidly, his tail lashing.
"Squirt."
Squirt's eyes widened. He lifted a shaking hand, his fingertips hovering just over the bruises on Hiccup's throat. Toothless gave a long growl.
"Ch...Chieftain... I... If I could...if I could undo it...if I could only undo it...!" Tears started to slip down his face.
"You can't, Squirt," Hiccup said quietly, showing no sign of fear even from the very hands that had caused those bruises. "Though if that's an apology, I accept. I know you're sorry, and I forgive you."
Squirt stared at him with the expression he always wore whenever Hiccup tried to explain a concept so foreign to him that he could not understand it.
"I forgive you, but...I still have to punish you. If not for me, then for Hookfang and Snotlout."
Squirt visibly relaxed. "Yes."
Hiccup was silent for a minute. An effective punishment had occurred to him immediately, but he was reluctant to use it because it seemed weird and narcissistic. He finally sighed and gave in when he couldn't think of anything else. "Squirt, you're not allowed to see me or communicate with me for three days."
Squirt reacted as if he'd been struck. "What?!" Whatever he had expected, it had not been this.
Toothless gave a vindictive smile.
"Three days in this dreamscape, and three days in Berk, not just one or the other. Same with whatever other worlds you might travel to in the meantime." Time did not always pass at the same rate in different worlds, and the Dream Master could not be permitted to 'cheat.' "Three days. If you need anything, you can ask Toothless, or Mom, or...basically, anyone but me. You're grounded from me. And you're not allowed into my dreams."
Squirt was staring at him as if Hiccup had ordered him to kneel down and cut off his own head.
Hiccup turned away, feeling very tired. "Come on, Toothless."
"Trust You, yes, trust You," Toothless purred, taking his hand. "My Hiccup is crazy and stupid but it's okay because He always makes it good anyway, I don't know how, my precious crazy human..."
"You do realize you're insulting me out loud, right?"
They returned to Berk. Squirt stood staring after them, still as stone. The light faded away, leaving his world smothered in darkness.
To be continued...
Author's Notes: Grounding Squirt from Hiccup really is the worst thing anyone could do to him. *sweatdrop* (Or Toothless, for that matter...)
So, question - in the previous chapter, at the very last minute, I deleted a line that went something like, "Squirt didn't realize that it was someone other than Hiccup to whom he truly spoke." The line felt a little awkward and unnecessary to me, and I hoped that people would still be able to pick up on the fact that Squirt's rage at Drago was being misdirected at Hiccup. But the responses I got seemed to indicate that it wasn't clear at all, so I added the explanation into this chapter instead. Do you think it works okay? If it doesn't, do you think I should add that line back into the previous chapter, or somehow edit it in this chapter, or...? (I need help. X'D Usually I'm not this bad about needing concrit so often; maybe I'm slipping...)
Requests are open for the month of December (though I make no promises about being able to actually follow through on them). For more details, see either my devART journal or my FFN profile.
I'm gonna go with the Narnia idea that time in different worlds doesn't always pass at the same relative rate. So, for example, a few minutes could pass in World 1 that equals years in World 2, and then later, a year could pass in World 1 that equals a few weeks in World 2, etc. Dream Masters can alter the rate of time in their own dreamscapes and possibly in other dream worlds, but of course not in any real worlds.